


only the star knows

by deathflare



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Drabble Collection, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, FFxivWrite2020, Female Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Mating Cycles/In Heat, Tumblr: FFXIVwrite, if you're here for the heatfic it's chapter 13
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:34:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 35,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathflare/pseuds/deathflare
Summary: A collection of pieces written for #FFXIVWrite2020.day #30 — splinter./splɪn.tər, splɪn.tɚ/:verb,to split into fragments, parts, or factions; break or cause to break into small sharp fragments.“My friend,” she explains, not looking at him. “G’raha Tia. Did you really not find him?”His turn to freeze.“I’ve had a lot of people die on me, Exarch,” she says. “Don’t try to spare me pain. It’s not a kindness.”
Relationships: Ardbert & Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Azem & Solus zos Galvus | Emet-Selch, G'raha Tia | Crystal Exarch/Warrior of Light, Lyna & G'raha Tia | Crystal Exarch, Warrior of Light & Thancred Waters
Comments: 309
Kudos: 266
Collections: #FFxivWrite2020 Final Fantasy 30 Day Writing Challenge, Emet-Selch's Wholesomely Debauched Bookclub FFXIV-Writes 2020 Collection, Heat Wave





	1. table of contents

[ **day #01 — crux.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/63878275) _wol centric, 939 words, T._

> Your fall wasn’t abrupt. It was a slow descent, one muted step at a time.

[**day #02 — sway.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/63918514) _wolexarch, 583 words, M._

> _Let me give you a private show,_ she’d said when she was done with her performance, clearly having caught him staring.

[**day #03 — muster.**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/63968332) _wolexarch, 1.3k words, T._

> Four times G’raha can’t muster the courage to follow his heart’s desire, and one time he can.

[**day #04 — clinch.**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64013110) _wolexarch, 1k words, E._

> “Not to say I dislike it, but you— _mmh,_ ” she says, or at least tries to, during the brief moments he removes his lips from her own to instead press them to her neck, “are particularly— _eager_ today.”

[**day #05 — matter of fact.**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64063033) _wol & thancred, implied wolexarch and thanuri, 1k words, M._

> Thoughts of _he’d make a good father_ and _would he be that patient as he ran those judicious hands through her naked body, teasing her until all she can do is beg_ cross her mind, and she briefly ponders the pros and cons of throwing herself down the stairs of the Mean.

[**day #06 — unspoken.**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64123072) _g'raha centric, 1.3k words, G._

> G’raha writes things he cannot say.

[ **day #07 — nonagenarian.**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64166164) _g'raha centric, 944 words, G._

> On the eve of his ninetieth nameday, the Exarch reminisces.

[ **day #08 — clamor.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64218331) _wol & g'raha, brief implied wol/g'raha, 1.1k words, M._

> The clamor of those they'd left behind still chases them, across the years.

[ **day #09 — lush.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64270549) _wolgraha, 1.2k words, E._

> “You are,” she rasps, “a cruel, _wicked_ , heartless man—”
> 
> He laughs, breath hot and heavy against her skin. “Am I truly, when I’m merely doing as you asked?”

[ **day #10 — avail.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64305388) _wol centric, 924 words, T._

> The Warrior of Light survives.

[ **day #11 — ultracrepidarian.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64358746) _azem & emet, 634 words, G._

> “If all of us were—whole, once,” she asks him, “then was I—was I someone you knew?”

[ **day #12 — tooth and nail.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64403080) _wolexarch heatfic, 1.9k words, E._

> “My friend,” he says, mildly, “whatever you need of me, you need only ask. Even if it’s out of my scope of—”
> 
> Something in her snaps. 
> 
> “Will you _fuck me,_ Exarch?” She spits, and a part of her relishes the way his mouth parts in shock.

[ **day #13 — longanimity.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64465183) _wol & ardbert, implied wolexarch, 906 words, G._

> “You’re lonely, aren’t you,” he says. “You’re not _alone,_ but you’re lonely.”

[ **day #14 — part.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64511683) _wolgraha, 1.1k words, E._

> Raha loves to tease. To have control.
> 
> But there’s a part of him that likes relinquishing it just as much, and she’d be lying if she said she didn’t enjoy it.

[ **day #15 — ache.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64546426) _wolexarch, 1.3k words, T._

> He finds her in the Quadrivium.
> 
> It’s raining. Pouring, actually, most of the people in the Crystarium having retired to their homes or to places they might find shelter. But she is here, under the open sky, alone and drenched, and she is _dancing._

[ **day #16 — lucubration.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64597432) _wolexarch, 1k words, T._

> G'raha works late, and Shiori worries.

[ **day #17 — fade.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64643947) _wol &ardbert, 927 words, T._

> “You’re reading my correspondence now?” she snaps, an odd sort of shame washing over her. Ardbert shakes his head.
> 
> “I didn’t need to,” he says, not looking at her. “I’ve watched you enough to know those are farewells.”

[ **day #18 — panglossian.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64689850) _wolexarch, 725 words, T._

> “What’s the first thing you would do if you could go back?” she asks him, voice so quiet he barely catches it. “Home, I mean.”

[ **day #19 — where the heart is.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64731715) _wolexarch, 1k words, E._

> “What do you want?” he asks. Always, always asks, even when he knows the answer, knows this is the only use he’ll ever be for her.
> 
> “Make me forget,” she whispers, quiet and quivery. “Please.”

[ **day #20 — eccedentesiast.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64778128) _wolexarch, 1.3k words, M._

> “Could you _love_ her, knowing what I am?” she asks. He doesn’t breathe. “Would you still care for her, if you knew the deepest, ugliest parts of her soul—those she hides with smiles and pleasantries?

[ **day #21 — foibles.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64830496) _wolexarch, 695 words, G._

> “Why are you here,” she mutters flatly. Cold. It reminds him of _her,_ but four—or two hundred and four, by his reckoning—years ago. A stonewall.
> 
> “It’s been three nights,” he says. “You need to sleep.”

[ **day #22 — argy-bargy.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64880101/) _wolexarch, 930 words, T._

> “"Cussing, angry Shiori is usually eight drinks Shiori,” says Alphinaud, “but this… particular type is one I'm not yet familiar with, I'm afraid." 
> 
> "How do you know this," Alisaie asks. Alphinaud's expression immediately goes vacant, the look in his eyes not unlike what G'raha has seen in soldiers after actual wars. He doesn't answer. Alisaie doesn't ask again.

[ **day #23 — shuffle.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64941661) _wolexarch, 2k words, T._

> “Indulge me,” she insists, seemingly amused by his hesitation. “It’s just harmless fun, my lord—something I’m sure both you and I could use more of.”
> 
> He swallows. There’s a deep, if irrational fear within him that she’ll somehow be able to pull a card that reads “G’raha Tia” in big, bold letters.

[ **day #24 — beam.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64986901) _wolgraha, 1k words, G._

> “Would you take me with you?” he asks before he can lose the courage to, cautiously hopeful. “In your next adventure.”
> 
> “Yes,” she says immediately, not a shred hesitation in her voice. “I would.”

[ **day #25 — wish.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/65010124) _wolgraha, 841 words, G._

> Shiori is twelve when her mother teaches her how to fold paper cranes.

[ **day #26 — when pigs fly.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/65054146) _wolgraha, 1k words, G._

> On the list of things Shiori says without knowing she’ll regret it in matter of minutes, there’s one in particular that is most catastrophic:
> 
> “You can _sing?”_

[ **day #27 — call.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/65108818) _wolexarch, 2k words, E._

> G’raha curses quietly, the sound barely reaching her ears. “What do you want, Shiori?”
> 
> His voice has taken that breathy, rough quality it always does when he starts getting worked up. It makes her heartbeat pick up insistently. “Tell me what you would do,” she says. “If you were here with me.”

[ **day #28 — irenic.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/65154781) _wolgraha, 713 words, G._

> She’s fourteen when grandmother teaches her the cards.

[ **day #29 — paternal.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/65201170) _lyna &exarch, wolexarch, 1.6k words, G._

> Lyna does not remember her parents.

[ **day #30 — splinter.** ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/65247442) _wolexarch, 1.3k words, G._

> She’s a star, he has always known, wearing the night sky over her shoulders and hiding constellations in her eyes—and only the star knows her secrets and her fears, what lies in the splintered shards of her heart. He may never fully piece them back together, but for as long as she allows him, he will continue to try.


	2. day #01 — crux. wol centric, 939 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #01 — crux.** /krəks,kro͝oks/: _noun,_ a particular point of difficulty; the decisive or most important point at issue.
>
>> In hindsight, it’s easy for one to point out that one day as the crux of your life, if they don’t know any better—the one moment that has made you who you are now, who you had to become.
>> 
>> The truth, however, is that it had never been just one day, one moment, one incident. Your fall wasn’t abrupt. It was a slow descent, one muted step at a time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so it begins! hopefully i'll manage. this piece in particular is focused on my wol's backstory—if you're interested on the shippy stuff, you might wanna head to the next chapter lmao
> 
>  **content warnings:** canon typical violence, mentions of minor character death

The first time, you are seven. 

You walk through the markets with your brother’s hand in yours, chest full of childish glee as you mull over the wares together, and then you hear a scream. A crowd forms, and you stand on your tiptoes in a feeble attempt to see over them, but Seiji pulls you away. 

“Let’s go home, Shiori,” he says, expression grim and eyes fixed ahead, and you don’t question him. You hear a woman’s cry as you walk away, and your brother’s grip on your hand tightens. You don’t look back. 

You are too young to understand the hushed whispers around the manor, that night— _insubordination, public execution, an example._ But the shadow of Garlemald hangs heavy over your home, and someday, you will understand the true meaning of it. 

The second time, you are twelve.

“I want to see it, someday,” Kazahana says as you two lie on the grass mulling over the pages of some dusty old tome you found in your grandfather’s belongings. 

“See what?” 

“Those places in the tome,” she explains, “the ones those heroes travel to. It would be nice, wouldn’t it? To leave this place and go on adventures?” 

“I suppose so,” you say. Is there any point in wondering, when you know you’ll never leave? 

The twinkle in her eye is contagious, however. “Let’s go together, someday,” she says, beaming, “just the two of us. Promise me.” 

She looks at you expectantly. “Alright,” you say, after a moment. You could never not do so, when she looks at you like that. “It’s a promise.” 

A fortnight later, Kazahana’s father speaks out of turn during a meeting with the tribunus. Three suns later, he doesn’t come home. 

She doesn’t speak of adventure anymore. You take the tome you two used to read, and tuck it away in a corner of your room. 

The third time, you are fourteen.

Your brother winces as you apply more salve to the cut on his back. You force your tears down as you look over the blood gushing from the inflamed gash, the flesh around it torn and red. 

“You could have gotten yourself killed, Seiji,” you chide, every ilm of your body still taut with concern. “If father hadn’t shown up, then—” 

“Then _what_ , Shiori? Should I just have let them _kill_ the old man for—what, being too old to work?” The sharpness of his voice makes you flinch. “We offer our own warriors to their infernal army like pigs to the slaughter so that the civilians can enjoy some _peace_ , and this is their notion of it?” 

“You _know_ there’s no reasoning with them,” you say, voice cracking, “is it really worth your own life to—” 

“It is!” he exclaims, then sighs, running a hand through his hair. “It is, sister. There are some things—some things that are worth dying for, if need be.” 

There’s a rush of shame you don’t fully understand that washes over you as he says that. “I don’t want you to die,” is all you can say, voice barely above a whisper, suddenly feeling incredibly childish. 

That makes Seiji deflate, the tenseness of his shoulders washing away. When he speaks again, his voice is the gentle one you are so used to. 

“I want to say you’ll understand, one day,” he says, turning around to press a kiss to the top of your head, “but my hope is that you won’t, because you won’t need to.” 

His words are of comfort, but all they do is make you feel like a coward. 

The fourth time, you are eighteen, and it’s that one day.

Your most vivid memory of it is your hair, the white a grim contrast to the pool of blood—of _your parents’ blood—_ it lies on, brutally cut from your head by the soldier’s blade. _I’m going to die,_ you think, and the thought scares you as much as the fact you nearly feel relief when you think it. 

What happens after that is a blur. There’s Seiji, and there’s more blood, and then the soldier is on the ground. You brother grabs your hand, and together you run and run and run until your legs give out. 

There are countless little moments before and in between all of these, but the last one happens when you’re nineteen.

You’ve crossed the ocean, and in this bustling city in the middle of the desert you’ve carved out a new home for yourselves—or what remains of you. 

One night, you can’t sleep. You pass by the door of your brother’s room, which hangs open just barely enough for you to see him, sitting by the edge of his bed, shoulders hunched and trembling. He clutches his arm—his sword arm, the one he nearly lost protecting your pathetic self from that Garlean soldier. The one he can’t use to fight anymore. 

It takes you a long moment to realize he’s crying. 

You go back to your room, you sleep, and you do not dream. The next day, you are nineteen, and as you step through the doors of the Arrzaneth Ossuary, you swear through clenched teeth to never be powerless again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). you can read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	3. day #02 — sway. wolexarch, 583 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #02 — sway.** /swā, sweɪ/: _noun,_ a rhythmical movement from side to side; rule, control.
>
>> _Let me give you a private show_ , she’d said when she was done with her performance, clearly having caught him staring. Things are never that simple with her, however, and perhaps he shouldn’t have been surprised when she promptly pushed him down to sit on the bed and then used her sash to _tie his wrists behind his back._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kinda want to make this longer someday.
> 
>  **content warnings:** implied sexual content, some very mild bondage

_Let me give you a private show_ , she’d said when she was done with her performance, clearly having caught him staring. Things are never that simple with her, however, and perhaps he shouldn’t have been surprised when she promptly pushed him down to sit on the bed and then used her sash to _tie his wrists behind his back._

“My love,” he pleads, “surely this isn’t necessary—” 

She leans forward, shushing him with a slender finger on his lips. Her smile is predatory, and he wonders if he even counts as prey when he’s so _willing_. 

“Be good,” she says, “and I’ll reward you.” 

There’s no music this time, but he doesn’t think he would have heard it even if there had been, the only sound in his head that of his own heartbeat. He watches, fascinated, her sway to this song only she can hear, eyes fixed on the slow roll of her hips as she looks down at him through her lashes. Her clothes—what little she has on—twirl around with her every move, the myriad golden chains tinkling in tandem, their colour stunning against the bright red of her garments. 

This dance is _much_ different than what she had performed for the citizens of the Crystarium, and he’s equal parts ecstatic and frustrated, to have her so close but not be able to _touch_. He can only stare, dazedly, as her chest moves through the strain of her garments with each mesmerizing arch of her body, and his mouth goes dry as she finally, finally comes closer, bending at the waist so they’re at eye level, hands resting on top of his thighs. 

This close, he could count each of her long eyelashes, and all it would take is for him to move a couple ilms forward to capture those plush lips with his own. She moves before he has the chance to, however, lips brushing against his ear instead. He shivers. 

“I really like it, you know. The way you look at me,” she says. “I think the years of having your face hidden have gotten to you, my lord Exarch, because you looked ready to _jump_ me, back then, the fact we were in front of the whole city notwithstanding.” 

“You make it exceptionally challenging to hold my composure,” he says. 

She chuckles and moves to join him on the bed, settling on top of his lap and throwing her arms over his shoulders. He’s a second away from tearing the bindings on his wrists. 

“Would you have done it, I wonder,” she says, leaning down to press that sinful mouth to his neck, “I would let you, you know—let you pin me down and tear at my skirts, take me in front of all of them. To show everyone the Warrior of Darkness can make their gentle and composed lord succumb to his desires like a man starved—what a _thrill_ that would be.” 

“You,” he rasps, “are a terrible woman.” 

“Well,” she laughs, reaching behind him to finally undo the knot around his wrists, “what are you going to do about it?” 

He grabs her hips as soon as his hands are free, pulling her body flush against his and kissing her until she’s breathless. He switches their positions so they’re lying on the bed, his body looming over hers—how lovely she looks, breathing heavily and lips glistening, eyes still twinkling with mirth. A challenge, like always. 

“You’ll find out,” he says, and leans down to kiss her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). you can read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	4. day #03 — muster. wolexarch, 1.3k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #03 — muster.** /məstər, mʌs.tɚ/: _verb_ , to collect or assemble; to summon up a particular feeling, attitude, or response.
>
>> Four times G’raha can’t muster the courage to follow his heart’s desire, and one time he can.

****

**i.**

“For a _master marksman_ , you certainly have terrible aim, G’raha Tia,” she laughs, dodging yet another of his snowballs. 

Rammbroes would definitely scold them for stopping to play in the snow like children when they’re meant to be picking up supplies from Camp Dragonhead, but right now G’raha really can’t bring himself to care. 

“I fail to see how my skill with the bow relates to—” he starts to say, but another snowball hits him squarely in the face before he finishes. 

Her laughter only grows louder. “My apologies, you were saying?” 

He wipes his face with one gloved hand. “Alright, then,” he says, smile perhaps a little menacing if her face is anything to go by. 

“Oh, come on, G’raha, it was merely a _jest—”_ she tries to say, but he’s already chasing her, the biggest snowball he could muster in his hands. Their little play chase ends up, unsurprisingly, being a bit of a foolish endeavor, and serves only to make them slip in the melting snow, sending them both tumbling down the hill. 

“Shiori? Are you alright?” he asks, realizing he had landed, quite gracelessly, on top of her. 

The way her shoulders shake makes him think for a brief panicked moment that he might have actually hurt her, but then she starts _laughing._

“We are—the biggest, most senseless _idiots_ in this entire realm,” she says, or tries to, through her fits of giggles. 

He can’t help joining her in laughter, for a few moments, but then—then he actually looks at her, lying underneath him, white hair spread out in the snow and cheeks flushed with cold, laughing childishly and gracelessly. 

It would take only a second for him to lean down and kiss the laughter from her lips. 

“G’raha?” she looks up at him, sounding concerned despite the smile still lingering on her lips, and any bravery he had mustered slips away like water through his fingers. 

“We should go,” he says, pointedly turning his gaze away from her mouth. 

“Oh,” she says, and he dares not wonder if the emotion in her voice is disappointment. “Alright.” 

They make the rest of their trip in silence, but the image of her underneath him haunts his thoughts for many suns to come. 

****

**ii.**

She calls out his name as the doors begin closing, but he does not— _dares_ not look back. What right does he have, to indulge himself in one last look, one last touch, if she would allow him, when he _knows_ he’s breaking her heart, like so many others who had left her behind? 

And yet it takes every onze of self control in his body _not_ to turn back, to halt the closing of the doors and take her in his arms, dry her tears and finally ask if she would have him—if not in the way he wants her to, then maybe for just one journey, one adventure by her side. Anything she would give him is already more than he could ask for; more than he deserves. 

The voices of his forebears are deafening, however, the grip of his father and his father’s father and all who had come before them ice cold around his limbs. 

_Destiny awaits,_ they whisper, and he buries the last of his selfish desires and lets the chorus beckon him forward. 

****

**iii.**

He’s been bracing himself for this moment for more than a hundred years, yet no amount of preparation could ever make him ready to face the reality of it. 

“Just like that? Then... G’raha Tia is…?” she asks, and the sound of that name for the first time in centuries, coming from her lips of all people, nearly breaks the resolve he’s been spending countless years strengthening. As always, she can break him with all but one word. 

_I’m here_ , he wants to say. _I’m sorry._

But that would be a cruelty to her, and he has—and will still—put her through far too much of it. 

“... I am not familiar with the name. Is there something I should know?” he says. It’s the least he can do for her, to be cruel to himself instead. 

He stands perfectly still as Shiori tells this stranger the tale of a young man with bright eyes and a destiny he sacrificed his life to see fulfilled. She remembers—every detail, every word. It wounds and delights him in equal measure. 

“... An extraordinary tale,” he says, for it truly is, when heard like this. “But I’m afraid I found no such individual residing in the tower when it passed into my care.” 

“I see,” is all she says, and he dares not look at her face or try to decipher the emotion in her voice as she says it. 

She follows him silently into the Ocular, and his only hope is that her memory of that young man remains so fond, once his duty is done. 

****

**iv.**

He fails to keep the one thing he had sworn to hide from her concealed, and this time he can’t avert his gaze from the hurt in her eyes. 

“G’raha Tia!” she cries out, even as she chokes on the liquid light that fills her throat. He can’t tell if what drips from her eyes is the same or if he has once again made her shed tears for his worthless self, but perhaps it is best he does not know. 

It makes him falter, nonetheless. 

“Thank you for fighting for this world—for believing,” he says instead, if only to prevent himself from lurching forward and embracing her, perhaps allowing himself this single selfish desire to know the taste of her lips before the rift consumes his very soul. “Fare you well, my friend—my inspiration.” 

He closes his eyes, lest whatever he sees on her face make him waver once and for all. He feels oddly at peace knowing that finally he will be free, and she will be safe—even if they won’t be together. 

And then there’s only searing pain, spreading from his chest to every part of his body. 

The last thing he sees before his world fades to black is her face, despair etched in every single one of her features. She reaches for him, but he can’t reach back. 

****

**v.**

His body feels heavy, but still not as heavy as his eyelids as he struggles to open them, blinking against the light around him. 

“Raha? Raha, can you hear me?” 

His gaze finally focuses, and he can see her, kneeling in front of him. There are tears rolling down her cheeks already, and she sounds winded—like she just sprinted here, if her disheveled hair and flushed cheeks are any indication. 

He reaches out to wipe a stray tear with his thumb. 

“I feel like all I ever do is make you cry,” he says, “but you’ll have to forgive the part of me that is happy to know you care about me thus.” 

She _breaks_ at that, actual sobs racking her body as she grips the front of his clothes and buries her face in his chest. 

“You—insufferable old fool,” she says, the sound muffled, “have you any _idea_ how worried I was—that you wouldn’t wake up, that you wouldn’t _remember—”_

He laughs despite himself, even harder when she moves away and punches at his chest, still crying. He can’t help it—how could he, when he’s so incandescently happy? 

“You’re incorrigible,” she chides, but he forgoes the apologies to instead pull her flush against his body and kiss her, slow and heated and _deep_ , to taste her and hold her and just let himself have what he wants so desperately—her, always her, the sound of her laughter and the salt of her tears and the warmth of her skin, anything and everything she will let him take. 

“I’m home,” he says, when they finally break apart for more than a few seconds to breathe. 

She laughs, shaking her head in disbelief, and he can hear her call him a fool even though she doesn’t speak. 

“Welcome home,” she answers instead, smiling even as tears still roll down her cheeks, and he can’t help smiling back at her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). you can read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	5. day #04 — clinch. wolexarch, 1k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #04 — clinch.** /klɪntʃ, ‘klinch/: _verb,_ to hold tightly or firmly; _noun,_ an embrace, especially an amorous one.
>
>> “Not to say I dislike it, but you— _mmh,_ ” she says, or at least tries to, during the brief moments he removes his lips from her own to instead press them to her neck, “are particularly— _eager_ today.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sometimes a prompt is just an excuse to be horny
> 
>  **content warnings:** explicit sexual content

He crowds her against the doors of her personal suite in a ravenous clinch barely a second after they enter, whoever might still be hovering outside be damned. 

“Not to say I dislike it, but you— _mmh,”_ she says, or at least tries to, during the brief moments he removes his lips from her own to instead press them to her neck, “are particularly— _eager_ today.” 

G’raha doesn’t answer, instead moving the hand he has threaded through her hair to unbutton her shirt. It proves to be particularly challenging to do so with one hand, however, and he settles for just— _tearing_ them apart, a couple of the buttons falling to the floor in his haste. 

Shiori groans. “I am going to have a joyful time explaining to my brother how exactly I ruined the shirt he had _just_ sewn for me—” she says, but her words dissolve into a moan when he moves to rub a pebbled nipple through the thin fabric of her undershirt. So sensitive. 

“You’ll manage,” he breathes, head spinning with so much _hunger_ he fears he might go mad. He had lived a hundred years with her touch and her warmth being only a memory—and even then, he never knew what it felt like to touch her like _this._ Now that he knew, he wondered how he had lived even a single moon without holding her in his arms, if a fortnight without her is enough to make his skin burn. 

“At least,” she says, pausing to press her mouth to his neck and _bite_ , soothing the sting with a sinful brush of her tongue, “take me to the bed.” 

He obliges, gripping her thighs and carrying her as she keeps nibbling and sucking at his throat, making him shiver. He drops her on the mattress with a little more force than he means to, moving immediately to pull her pants off, smalls and all, then his own robes—why in the world did he have to wear such a complicated thing to take off, he wondered—while she took upon herself to remove her ruined blouse and undershirt. 

The cool air against his scorching skin is both uncomfortable and a relief, and he wastes no time bending down to kiss the wings of her collarbones, to lay claim to her perky, flushed breasts. The marks he had left the last time have faded, and he has no intention of letting her leave this room until he has adorned her with a new set of them. 

She’s impatient, however, pulling at his hair and rutting against his thigh even as she whimpers and mewls with every brush of his tongue and teeth against the sensitive skin of her tits. 

“Raha, I _need_ you,” she pleads. “Please.” 

That gives him pause, and he rests his forehead on her chest for a moment to collect himself. She wants him, _needs_ him, as much as he needs her—he can hear it in her voice, feel it in the wet trail she left against his thigh, in the way she holds him so desperately, as if there was a chance in the world he would leave. If he’s somehow still asleep in the tower and this is another of his wishful dreams, may humanity never find the means to wake him up. 

“How do you want me,” he asks, looking straight into her eyes. He has to hear it. “Tell me, and I’ll give it to you.” 

She holds his gaze even as she moves to spread her legs further, taking one of his hands into her own. The tender clinch is a starking contrast to the obscene way she offers herself to him, and his heart feels like it might burst out of his chest at any second. 

“Like this,” she says. “Any way, as long as it’s you.” 

G’raha stops thinking, stops worrying, stops hesitating. He leans down to take her lips in a wild, messy kiss, licks at her teeth and tongue as he lines himself up and buries himself in her a long, slow sway of his hips, swallows her moans as she arches up and wraps her legs around his waist, her grip on his hand so strong he fears her nails might actually break skin. He hopes they do. 

Awareness becomes a blur as he begins to move, too far gone to keep the pace languid—just takes, takes and takes. The pleasure spreads through his body in waves, a liquid pulse, and he swallows all of her pretty, desperate sounds, buries his face in the crook of her neck when even holding himself up feels like too much. Soon there’s only static in his head, the only sounds in the room the slap of skin on skin and their rhythmic panting, nothing in the world but the two of them and this moment, this feeling. 

She cries out his name like a prayer, and G’raha loses whatever he had left of his mind. He shivers, thrusts impossibly harder, frantic and with no rhythm, wordless, mindless and shameless. She wraps her arms around his neck and pulls him down, licking into his mouth and swallowing his groans, running a hand through his hair and _tugging._

“Raha,” she cries, “Raha, ‘m so close—” 

She tenses soon after the words leave her mouth, lips parted around a high, broken moan, whole body shaking as she comes, her fingers so tight in G’raha’s hair it actually hurts. The sight of her lost to pleasure would be enough, but the way she clenches around him is what tips him over the edge, his body locking up and trembling as he comes deep inside of her. 

He collapses sideways across her body, elbows giving out, and she holds him, runs a gentle hand through his hair, whispers sweet nothing in his ear as he comes down from his high. When his limbs feel solid again, he shifts, moves to hold her instead, her head nuzzled against his bare chest. 

“I missed you,” he says. 

“Do tell,” she chuckles, but her smile grows tender soon after. “I missed you too.” 

He lets exhaustion take over him soon after, and with her in his arms, sleep comes easily. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). you can read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	6. day #05 — matter of fact. wol&thancred, implied wolexarch&thanuri, 1k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #05 — matter of fact.** \ma-tər-ə(v)-ˈfakt\: _noun,_ what is distinct from opinion or conjecture; _adjective,_ unemotional and practical.
>
>> Thoughts of _he’d make a good father_ and _would he be that patient as he ran those judicious hands through her naked body, teasing her until all she can do is beg_ cross her mind, and she briefly ponders the pros and cons of throwing herself down the stairs of the Mean.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **content warnings:** alcohol consumption, pining, thancred

Shiori’s drunk—like, actually might either start telling people things she’ll soon regret or pass out on the spot at any moment drunk. It’s been a couple years since she has been this _wasted_ , but gods damn it, she’s earned herself some respite, alright? 

She sits on a table further away from the crowd for now—as much as she appreciates the people of the Crystarium and their attempt to show her and the Scions their gratitude by means of a terribly extravagant party, she’s never been much of a people person, and huge gatherings like those tire her out very quickly, the alcohol in her blood notwithstanding. 

And, well. From here it’s easier to watch him, and wallow in her own misery without being disturbed. 

The man in question is currently surrounded by the same Mystel children that had braided her hair and woven flowers into it, all the while bombarding her with more questions than she could manage to answer with one mouth—the usual _why did you become an adventurer_ and _how did you get to be so strong_ , with some more complicated ones such as _how did you and the Exarch meet_ and _are you guys going to get married_ thrown in at times. 

Right now he’s kneeling among them while they curiously marvel over his crystal arm and his intricate robes, some playing with the whitened tips of his hair and one actually trying to weave a flower into his locks like they’d done with yours. He entertains them with gentle hands and patient words, no sign of the cheeky, if a little brash young man she had met four years ago to be seen. 

Thoughts of _he’d make a good father_ and _would he be that patient as he ran those judicious hands through her naked body, teasing her until all she can do is beg_ cross her mind, and she briefly ponders the pros and cons of throwing herself down the stairs of the Mean. The children ask him something she can’t hear, and he for once appears actually flustered, throwing a nervous glance in her direction. Shiori schools her expression into something neutral as quickly as she can, giving him a wry smile. _They’re your problem now._

“Considering they’re being held in your regard, I fear you staying away from the festivities defeats the point of them, my friend,” she hears. 

She glances up to see Thancred, tankard in hand, already moving to sit on the chair beside hers. 

“They’re not only for me,” Shiori answers, “and even if they were, should I not be able to do as please, as the subject to be celebrated? I feel I’ve earned myself a breath of respite.” 

“Oh, is that why you were here? I thought you had merely sought the best vantage point to ogle the object of your affections, if the way you’ve been staring at your new old friend like a lovestruck schoolgirl is anything to go by,” he says, the shite-eating grin spread over his face tempting Shiori to dump what remains in her own tankard over his clothes. 

“Speak louder, why don’t you,” she hisses instead, glad she can excuse the flush on her cheeks as a consequence of the alcohol. 

“Forgive me the nosiness. I am simply surprised to finally meet the one able to win your heart, after all the lords and ladies that have battled for your affections. But I suppose no one has quite crossed the bounds of time and space and laboured a hundred years to save your life like he has.” 

Shiori groans, taking another long chug of her ale. Nevermind what she’d thought earlier—she is definitely still not drunk enough for this. 

“I don’t mean to pry,” Thancred says, prying, “but pray answer me this—why not tell him? Surely you don’t doubt a man who calls you _his inspiration_ and has dedicated a century of his life to saving yours isn’t, at the very least, _madly_ in love with you.” 

“Well, you're mistaken on that regard,” she says. “He is, as a matter of fact, in love with someone _else_ —she’s the brave warrior from the tales he read in the future he comes from, the fearless, dauntless hero who ended wars and liberated nations and who was somehow still a beacon of hope for the people in a world she failed to save. She’s the Warrior of Light, flawless and immaculate—not the woman behind the title, with all of her flaws and weaknesses and _baggage._ She’s not— _me_.” 

Nothing like being stupidly drunk to make her unusually honest. Thancred is silent for a long moment, and while she can feel his eyes on her, she keeps her own gaze pointedly on the table in front of them. 

“You are more than your flaws, Shiori,” he says finally, voice unusually gentle. 

_So what if I am_ , she thinks. _I’ll still never be good enough for someone like him._ G’raha is kind and selfless, loved by an entire nation for his compassion and leadership. He is the one who gave up his life to wait in slumber for the sake of a future he would one day inherit; who freely gave a century of his years to save two stars from certain doom. His warm and gentle hands have given life and protected it; hers only know how to destroy. What right does she have, to tarnish his gleaming light with her dreary darkness? 

“He still deserves better than this, after all he’s done,” she says instead, quickly forcing her lips around a smile before continuing. “But you surely seem interested in _my_ love life, when you have plenty of turmoil on your own, master Waters. Pray tell me, when do _you_ intend to tell our resident astrologian about your certainly not platonic feelings?” 

_That_ gives him pause, to no shortage of her satisfaction. 

“I,” he says, averting her eyes, “haven’t the _faintest_ idea what you’re talking about, my friend.” 

She laughs, turning her voice into her best impression of Thancred-from-four-years-ago. “I guess poetry only _falls unbidden from your lips_ when there are no _complicated feelings_ involved, my dearest minstrel.” 

“Must you humiliate me so,” he asks. 

“You started it.” 

“Then I shall end it,” he says, standing up and offering her his hand. “Join me for a dance, my lady, that we may forget our emotional turmoils even if just for a few minutes?” 

She laughs, but in the end, she takes his hand. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you as always for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). you can read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	7. day #06 — unspoken. g'raha centric, 1.3k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #06 — unspoken.** \ʌnˈspoʊ.kən, ənˈspōkən\: _adjective,_ not spoken, although thought of or felt; not expressed in speech.
>
>> G’raha writes things he cannot say.

  
**(a letter, neatly folded, placed before a headstone)**

_Father,_

_Today my work saw me admitted to the Students of Baldesion._

_You used to tell me you hoped I wouldn’t let this eye of mine dictate how I would choose to live my life, so I believe that first and foremost, an apology is in order._

_I am sorry I didn’t live up to your hopes. I am not, however, sorry for what I have chosen to do._

_I saw the way it weighted at you, the feeling of having something you must do but never knowing what it was. I didn’t understand, as a child, how crushing it must be; but with every year that passes, the feeling grows on me as well. I dream, sometimes, about things I know are important, things that I must remember. Yet when I wake, the memories are gone, leaving only a gaping hollow in my chest that I never seem to be able to fill._

_But that emptiness, that doubt—it ends with me. This I swear to you._

_I hope that, on the day we meet again, you will be able to say you are proud of me._

_Love,_  
_Raha_

**(a piece of wrinkled parchment, broken down by the waters of lake silvertear)**

_My friend,_

_Forgive me the sentimentality of this letter. There has been a somewhat dire feeling overcoming me for a while now, and I fear this might be my last chance to convey my thoughts to you, should the worst happen once we enter the World of Darkness tomorrow._

_I believe first and foremost, I owe you an apology. Not just for our less than ideal first meeting, but for my entire demeanor through the course of this expedition. Though it beggars belief, I am not oblivious to my own foolishness, as you are wont to call it, and I know my actions have, at times, been less than ideal._

_All that I have done, however, I have done with the admittedly embarrassing intention to impress you. Pray do not hold this against me—before someone like you, one is inevitably inspired to better themselves, that they might one day be but a dim glow next to your blinding light._

_That, perhaps, is the point I intended to convey in this missive. That to me you have been the greatest inspiration, the driving force that makes me want to be and do better—the star by which I hope to chart my course. Whatever I do tomorrow, know that I will do so with the hope that, someday, my own star will rise to meet yours, even though it will undoubtedly never shine as brilliantly._

_On that day, I pray you will still find within you the kindness to grant me a place by your side._

_Hopefully still your friend, by the time this reaches you,_  
_G’raha Tia_

****

**(a torn page of a journal, lost to time)**

_I visited your grave today._

_It’s beautiful, the view from it—though little remains of what once was Ishgard. It has been many long years, but even the most ruthless among us don’t dare disturb your place of rest. For that, I am thankful._

_I left you a flower. They’re hard to come by, these days. I hope you like it._

_The ones who roused me have come up with quite the ingenious plan, you see. They’re a noble bunch, the lot of them—so fearless and hopeful, even in the face of unrelenting despair. I cannot measure up to them, not in courage nor in selflessness, but I have been entrusted with their wishes nonetheless, that I may one day deliver them to you._

_Hopefully, then, I’ll get the chance to say I am sorry._

****

**(crumpled parchment, littered in a corner of the umbilicus)**

_Mother,_

_I believe you would faint if I were to tell you in person that you now have a great-granddaughter, but it is true nonetheless. Granted, you always wanted grandchildren, but certainly you didn’t expect me to skip a step when it came to that._

_That said, I believe I owe you an apology—truly, now I understand the suffering I brought upon you when I was a boy myself. I believe you should be thankful, however, that unlike Lyna, I didn’t have access to an ancient tower of gigantic proportions where I could hide myself from you for hours on end._

_If only you could be here, to guide me through my clumsiness like always. Lyna would love you; as you would love her, I’m certain. And as I love you._

_—I miss you, mother. Desperately and hopelessly so._

_Your son,_  
(ILLEGIBLE) 

****

**(an envelope safely stored in a drawer, never delivered)**

_My friend,_

_If you are reading this, then, hopefully, my plan has succeeded, and my duty come to an end._

_Doubtlessly you are mourning, in spite of the fact I am not worth your grief; because your kindness truly knows no bounds, and is one of the greatest reasons I would happily go through all that I have a thousand times over, as long as it meant keeping you safe and alive._

_But first and foremost—I am sorry. It is too late and too little, but it is true nonetheless. Pray know that all that I said and all that I did was with the utmost conviction that there was no alternative, for I would never willingly deceive or hurt you. I am painfully aware that you have suffered far too much of both through your life._

_But I digress. Pray allow me to speak plain._

_Though I have told you far too many lies during our brief time together, my affections are undoubtedly true, and shall always remain so. Even if I am no longer able to stand by your side—nor do I have the right to—know that, wherever I may be, I shall watch over you, always._

_I will not ask for your forgiveness. I pray only that, from now on, you may greet each coming dawn with a smile._

_Yours,_  
_The Crystal Exarch_

****

**(a letter, safely sealed. awaiting delivery.)**

_My dearest Lyna,_

_I pray this missive finds you in good health and high spirits._

_It has only been a few days since I woke in this new old body, but you have not left my thoughts for a second since then—nor will you ever._

_Lyna—there are no words to express how deep my sorrow and regret at not being able to tell you these words in person runs. Yet tell them I must, if you would still be willing to listen to the ramblings of an old man who is utterly undeserving of your love._

_My dear, sweet Lyna. My love for you is boundless—as is my gratitude, for all that you’ve done and will do, for myself and the good people of the Crystarium. Having you in my life is a privilege I do not deserve, but that I am eternally grateful you chose to grant me nonetheless. I am, now and ever, incredibly proud of you, and though I can no longer be by your side, I shall always pray for your safety and happiness._

_I am aware I have kept you in the dark about my past for far too long, and for that I am, yet again, deeply sorry. But know that, should you want to learn about it at last, you need only say the word. There shall be no more secrets between us, should that be your wish. I have asked far too much of you across the years—’tis now your turn to ask of me whatever you heart desires, and I shall answer most gladly._

_The bounds of space and time may keep us apart for now, but you shall always be my dearest granddaughter._

_With my deepest love and wishes for your happiness,_  
_The man once known as the Crystal Exarch_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	8. day #07 — nonagenarian. g'raha centric, 944 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #07 — nonagenarian.** \nänəjəˈnerēən, nɑː.nə.dʒəˈner.i.ən\: _noun,_ a person who is between 90 and 99 years old.
>
>> On the eve of his ninetieth nameday, the Exarch reminisces.

He refuses to tell the people of the Crystarium when it is, despite their insistence. 

That day is the day G’raha Tia was born, and G’raha Tia is gone—along with his youth and his foolish, selfish dreams. 

His tenth is the earliest one he can remember. 

There’s only him and his parents—his eye has granted him many things, from a grandiose destiny to inconvenient headaches, but the earliest one was this: a childhood devoid of friendship. Children can be cruel, he learned far too early, at least to those they perceive as… different. Odd. And other less kind words they had made sure he heard. 

He blows the candles on the cake his mother baked for him, and tries very hard not to cry. 

“Happy nameday, Raha,” his mother’s kind voice says, stroking his cheek affectionately. He forces his tears down and smiles at her, mumbles a word of thanks. 

“Have you made a wish?” His father asks, a firm yet gentle hand on his shoulder. G’raha nods. 

“Yes,” he answers, “but if I tell you, it won’t come true.” 

They laugh, and then they eat. 

G’raha doesn’t have the heart to tell them he wished he would wake up tomorrow with another cyan eye. 

His nineteenth is a turning point. 

“Krile,” he huffs, “you have been dragging me around these hallways for half a bell—if you can’t find the way after all the years you’ve been here, then surely _I_ won’t be the one to.” 

“Shush, Raha,” she chides, “we’re almost there.” 

Krile had dragged him away from the library with some excuse about needing his help with something and he had been quick to oblige, but he hadn’t expected they’d need to _walk_ so much to find whatever it was that she needed help with. 

“Krile, you know I need to prepare for the next evaluation. If there might be a better time to—” 

“We’re here, master so-very-pressed-for-time,” she says. “Come on, now.” 

He moves to open the door before them, and then there are a myriad flashing sparks right on his face. 

“Happy nameday, G’raha Tia!” A booming chorus of voices shouts. 

When his vision clears he sees—everyone. As in, all of their colleagues, wearing ridiculous party hats and gathered around a table where a terrible mess of a—cake?—stands. 

“Wha—” 

“You’ll have to forgive us that, uh, _thing_. As you’re well aware, the culinary arts aren’t exactly our field of specialty,” Krile says. “But I promise it’s edible. Mostly.” 

He has no idea what is happening right now. “You guys—” 

“Why didn’t you _tell_ us when your nameday was, G’raha?” One of the girls in his class asks. “We had to get Krile to look through her grandfather’s student logs to find out!” 

Oh. 

It’s his nameday. He didn’t even… remember. The last time he had celebrated it was the year before his father’s death, and even that was a few years before he was admitted here. 

He didn’t think anyone would ever—bother. No one ever had. 

“Come blow the candles,” someone else calls. “Oh, and do try to not set anything on fire this time around—we’ve had enough of that during your first year.” 

They laugh, and he lets himself be ushered forward until he’s right in front of the table. The cake is hideous, and he strongly doubts Krile’s claim of it being edible. 

It’s the best present anyone has ever given him. 

When he once again tries very hard not to cry as he blows the candles that cover the grisly lump his friends call a cake, it’s for an entire different reason from nine years ago. 

On his twenty-fourth, he gets a present from a star. 

“Huh?” he asks, dumbfounded. “What’s this?” 

Shiori fidgets. He has seen her appear less nervous when facing the prospect of certain death. 

“Rammbroes told me it was your nameday,” she explains. “I remember you mentioning you were running out of pages on your journal so I—I bought that. It’s nothing special, I just—it felt wrong not to get you anything, now that I knew.” 

In his hands there’s a small, rectangular box. Inside it, he finds a simple leather journal, its cover adorned with a beautiful pattern in silvery highlights. Atop of it rests a quill pen, a bright red not unlike his hair, and a small vial of ink. 

“If it’s not to your liking, then—” 

“No!” He exclaims, perhaps a little too loudly, considering the way she startles. “I mean—no, I like it. Love it, in fact. I—Thank you, Shiori.” 

She looks so _happy_ at his words one would be inclined to think it’s _her_ nameday. 

As much as he appreciates the present in his hands, he can’t help the mawkish thought that her smile is the best gift she could ever give him. 

He stands before his mirror in the Ocular. Tomorrow, he turns ninety—in non-slumbering years, at least. What an odd feeling, to become a nonagenarian. Odder still, that he somehow feels _older_ than the amount of years that precede him. 

Before him, a familiar scene plays out. A young man, standing about in Mor Dhona, a familiar box in his hands and a familiar young woman before him, looking uncharacteristically nervous. 

How cruel, this irregular passage of time between worlds is, to make him witness such on a day like this. 

He turns off the image and retires to his personal quarters early for once. On his nightstand lies a leather journal, still unfilled after so many years. He traces the delicate pattern on its cover with his fingers. Someday, perhaps. 

“Just me and you today, old friend,” he says, and lets sleep claim him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	9. day #08 — clamor. wol&graha, implied wol/graha, 1.1k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #08 — clamor.** \klamər, kla-mər\: _noun,_ a loud uproar, as from a crowd of people; a loud, continuous noise.
>
>> The clamor of those they'd left behind still chases them, across the years.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **content warnings:** graphic descriptions of violence, trauma nightmares

He’s still a boy when it first happens. 

It’s a dream—the only one he had during his childhood that he remembers by the time he wakes. In it, he stands before a young woman, her eyes a bright crimson like his own, and she reaches for his hand, her features twisted in anguish. 

“Desch,” she calls him. “You must—” 

Her lips move, but whatever she says after that, he cannot hear. 

“I will see it done, your highness,” he hears himself say, with a voice not his own. “No matter what—” 

The scene shifts, fades. He sees flashes of other events—resistance fighters raiding a palace; the very earth cracking open and crumbling away, swallowing a gigantic tower with it; the clamors of despair from a people who have just witnessed the fall of civilization. 

Then there are—faces. Men and women, young and old, their eyes the same as his own—pearls of crimson bisected in black. They surround him, and though each of their voices is barely above a whisper, together they are deafening. 

_You must,_ they say. _Her wish, our wish—you must be the one to—_

He wakes with a startle. The voices fade, but the emptiness in his chest remains for many years to come. 

She starts hearing—and seeing it—after she turns eighteen. 

Perhaps it was to be expected. Physically, she made it through that day nearly unscathed, so the gods must have seen fit to give her soul scars to match the ones on her brother’s body. 

It happens when she dreams. She’s back on that moment—kneeling before the two mangled bodies even she can barely recognize as her parents, only static in her ears and all of her limbs heavy as lead. 

And then they move. 

They, and every single person around her—every person she had tried and failed to save. They crawl through the debris, a gruesome trail of bloodied innards and torn, burnt skin in their wake, and they grab at her—tear her clothes and hack her flesh, the clamor of their voices more painful than the growing, gaping wounds on her body. 

_Why didn’t you do anything_ , they cry out. _Why didn’t you protect us? Why were you so weak? Why, why, why—_

_I’m sorry,_ she tries to say as her mother’s nails claw at her throat, death’s grip claiming her consciousness. _I wanted to. I tried. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry._

When she wakes, the memory of her dreams terrifies her as much as the fact that a part of her wished they had been real. 

The voices are the loudest they have ever been after the doors close. 

They guide him, through each notch of the endless stairs that lead to the peak of the Syrcus Tower. With every step he takes, they claim a little more of his reason. He’s thankful for that, somewhat—at least in those last few moments, he won’t have the clarity to truly fathom what he’s surrendering. 

He comes to a halt in front of the throne, traces the edge of the seat with hesitant fingers. How disheartening, to think so many could have been spared a life of doubt and emptiness, were it not for a single man’s unbridled ambition. 

Bygones are bygones, however. It ends with him, now. 

He sits on the throne and takes a deep breath, feels the tower’s pulse as it were his own. Exhaustion overcomes him, and he doesn’t resist. 

The last thing he hears before slumber takes him is the voice of that same young woman he saw in that dream, so many years ago. _Thank you,_ she whispers, and the emptiness within him vanishes at last. 

With each loss, there are new faces in her dreams. 

Moenbryda shows up first, tearing a hole in Shiori’s chest to match her own. G’raha comes after, inviting her to join him in slumber before he snaps her neck. Minfilia gives her a hug, then sinks her silver knife on her back as the ceiling comes crashing down on their heads. 

Sometimes they just talk. _If you weren’t so weak, maybe,_ they clamor, _maybe we would still be here, wouldn’t we?_

She prefers when they kill her. 

When Haurchefant joins them, she stops sleeping. 

The ancient chorus is no more, but there’s no shortage of voices in his mind, be it when he’s awake or when he slumbers. 

After Biggs and the others rouse him, it’s usually his old friends. He wasn’t there to see it, but even the image of them lying lifeless on the ground as Black Rose halts the very flow of aether within their bodies, or, perhaps worse, _surviving_ to see what the world becomes after—it’s too much to bear. 

Once he arrives on the First, it’s those he left behind. _We’re sorry for sending you alone,_ they’d said, so many times, as if _he_ was the unfortunate one, he who would at least be free from that godsforsaken world, ruined beyond salvation. He prays every night that he might one day have a fraction of their bravery within himself. 

Then, it starts being the people of the Crystarium. A literal clamor, sometimes, so many who now look to him, undeserving and unprepared as he is, for guidance and protection and _leadership_. 

Whoever the voices belong to, however, the message has always been clear: he cannot afford to fail. 

Her homeland is free. 

She learns that they had buried them, all of them, after she and her brother fled. They show her the way, but it takes a long time before she feels ready to see it. 

The day she does, she goes alone. She walks through every grave, reads every name, then stops when she arrives at the ones she was most afraid to see. _Mizuki_ , reads one, and _Hibiki,_ the other. She kneels, silently. 

“I’m home, mom, dad,” she says. Then she cries. 

The nightmares don’t stop entirely. But they’re a little less frequent, and the voices a little more quiet. 

He kisses her awake, just because he can. 

“Raha,” she whispers, stirring in his arms, voice still groggy with sleep. “I missed you.” 

“I’ve been here all along, love,” he says. He would never leave. Not now, that he’s been given a second chance. 

“I don’t see you in my dreams. At least, not anymore,” she explains. “But I’m sure you understand when I say I am rather thankful for that.” 

He does understand. Better than anyone, perhaps. 

The voices of those they had left behind still chase them, across the years—but at least, when they’re not alone, their clamor is made the tiniest bit more bearable. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading~ you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	10. day #09 — lush. wolgraha, 1.2k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #09 — lush.** /ləSH, lʌʃ/: _adjective,_ appealing to the senses; attractive to look at, taste or smell.
>
>> “You are,” she rasps, “a cruel, _wicked_ , heartless man—”
>> 
>> He laughs, breath hot and heavy against her skin. “Am I truly, when I’m merely doing as you asked?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **content warnings:** explicit sexual content, very mild bondage and blindfolding

“You are,” she rasps, “a cruel, _wicked_ , heartless man—” 

He laughs, breath hot and heavy against her skin. “Am I truly, when I’m merely doing as you asked?” 

He runs a hand down the side of her body, stopping at her hip and thumbing lazily at the skin around her hip bone. She shivers, thighs clenching involuntarily. 

“Besides, your mouth says one thing, but your body says quite another,” he presses those wicked lips to the juncture of her jaw and neck. “If you truly want me to stop, you know you need only say the word.” 

She can’t actually see him, with the blindfold over her eyes, nor can she touch him, preferably to thread a hand through his hair and force those lush lips where she actually wants them, with the way her wrists are bound to the headboard. But she can definitely picture the self-satisfied smile he surely has on his face right now, always taking so much pleasure in making her whimper and squirm and _beg_. 

“Enough teasing,” she breathes. 

“I don’t think so,” he says. “I said I would kiss every ilm of your body, and I have no intention of stopping until I do so.” 

He leans down and presses a kiss to her lips, slow and soft and _reverent_ , fits their mouths together and slides his tongue along the bottom of her lip, pulling at her hair so he can trail kisses down her jaw and over her throat. 

Shiori gasps, voice breathy as he scatters feathery kisses down her neck, over the wings of her collarbones, up the length of her arms. He slides his hands down her chest to palm at her breasts, the touch soft and gentle and not nearly _enough_ , before his mouth follows and he kisses and sucks the sensitive skin, wraps his lips around a pebbled nibble and _sucks_ , rubs his tongue over it until she’s whimpering and squirming. 

"You're so beautiful," Raha says, fingers trailing down her stomach and tracing the edges of her scars. 

The ones in her arms are few and small, but her torso is littered with them, a particular gruesome one crossing her stomach diagonally, courtesy of Zenos. She hides them, usually, be it with just clothes or even glamouring her bare skin. They’re _ugly_ , an inevitable result of so much time spent on the battlefield, she knows, but she still feels terribly self-conscious every time she glances at herself in the mirror. 

“You don’t need to—” she shivers when he presses a kiss to the one around the curve of her waist, “I know they’re not pretty, Raha.” 

“They are to me,” he says, simply. “I love everything about you. Even the parts you hate.” 

“You are so _mushy._ ” 

He chuckles. “Perhaps I am. But if you’re still disinclined to believe me, then I’ll just have to show you.” 

She feels him shift, then his hands around her head, untying the blindfold and covering her eyes as she adjusts to the light again. 

“What—” 

“Watch,” he says, sliding down her body to once again trail kisses down her stomach, mouth tracing every bit of skin, every scar and every blemish he can find. Gods, those _lips_. The mere sight of them was enough to haunt her thoughts on particularly lonely nights, but the feel of them on her skin, so soft and lush—it drives her mad. 

He continues his ministrations even as she writhes, traces her skin with his fingers and mouth and tongue and teeth, like her body is a picture he wants to commit to memory on touch alone. Heat pools insistently between her legs, and when her squirming becomes too much he pins her hips down, looks directly at her as he presses an unbearably soft kiss right below her navel. 

“Patience, love,” he says, sitting back on his knees and shuffling backwards, running his fingers lightly down the length of Shiori’s thighs and over her knees. “I’ll make it worth your while.” 

“Like I said—heartless.” 

“If I am, the blame lies with the lady who stole it, wouldn’t you say?” 

“And again— _mushy,”_ she says, even as her cheeks flush and she averts his eyes. 

He chuckles, wrapping his hands behind her knees and pulling her legs up and around his shoulders. 

“Your legs,” he growls, running his fingers up her inner thighs, “were the source of many an inappropriate thought to me, back then. The way you dress—it doesn’t help.” 

“Do tell.” 

“I would dream about marking them,” he kisses the side of her shins, “wanted to see you walk around, struggling to hide the bruises with those short skirts of yours.” 

She gasps when he spreads her legs apart, his gaze becoming increasingly less teasing and more _hungry_. “You certainly were—possessive.” 

“Hmm,” he hums, lowering himself and pressing his lips to her inner thigh to _bite_ , “I still am.” 

“Then take me,” she says. 

His eyes are so dark. “What do you want,” he asks. 

“Your mouth.” 

He hums curiously as if pondering her request, scatters more kisses over her inner thighs, anywhere but where she _wants,_ before stopping and looking at her from his place between her legs. 

“As you wish,” he says, smug, and dives in. 

Raha had been _unfairly_ skilled with his mouth since their first time, but following it he had apparently decided to make it his life’s mission to find every way to drive her mad, to discover which brushes and twists of his tongue would make her _scream_. He has succeeded, to both her delight and embarrassment, especially in a situation like this, where she has no way to muffle the noises he draws out of her. 

“Gods above, Raha—” 

She writhes so much he grips her hips hard enough to bruise and pins them _down_ , forces her flush against his face _—_ for all of his teasing before, right now he clearly has no intention other than making her come. Her thighs clench so tightly around his head she’s sure it must hurt, but it only makes him moan, the vibrations working her up all the higher. 

Raha _knows_ her, and that goes for everything—from the way she likes her tea and what silly romance novels have made her cry to how to give her head: how much pressure she likes, what speed, exactly what each embarrassing noise that she would _kill_ him if he ever brought up outside of the bedroom means. 

She doesn’t last. 

Her climax comes to her in waves, rolling like fog over mountains—makes her back arch and her toes curl, her mouth parting in a silent scream. It leaves her so sensitive that she sucks in a breath and bites her lip to stop herself from screaming when Raha licks at her one last time before moving up and untying her hands, gently massaging where the bindings left faint imprints on her wrists, no doubt due to her trashing. 

“Are you alright?” He asks, hovering over her and cupping her cheek with a gentle hand, thumbing at her cheekbone. 

“More than,” she answers, smiling, pulling him down for a long, slow kiss. 

Before they break apart she pushes him, making him tumble sideways on the bed. She moves to sit on top of him and hold his arms down, smirking down at him not unlike he had done to her not too long ago. 

“My turn,” she says, then leans down to kiss him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	11. day #10 — avail. wol centric, 924 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #10 — avail.** /əˈvāl, ə-ˈvāl/: _verb,_ to be of use or advantage; to produce or result in as a benefit.
>
>> The Warrior of Light survives.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _*waves hands*_ idk
> 
> bad timeline AU, or i guess not technically AU since there was a canon timeline in which all of this happened, just not this slowly. sorry shiori
> 
>  **content warnings:** major character death

The Eight Umbral Calamity is a gradual affair. 

The first time Black Rose comes, it’s over Coerthas. 

Shiori knows before she sees it. That silence, that atmosphere—she has felt it before, has heard it far too many times. There’s no way to describe it other than death, eerie and muted and all-consuming. 

It still doesn’t prepare her for when she actually sees it. 

For all of Ishgard’s unfriendliness, Camp Dragonhead had always managed to feel a bit like home, thanks, she is well aware, in no small part to Haurchefant—even before she ended their thousand-year war and the Ishgardians decided she was perhaps worth a little begrudging respect. 

So when she walks past its gates to the sight of the corpses of the people who had been impossibly kind to her through her darkest hour, she forgives herself the moment of weakness. 

It’s too much like home. It’s too much like she’s eighteen and her village is on fire and everyone she knows is dead, gone because she couldn’t protect them, gone because she’s pathetic and useless and _weak._

She opens the doors to the commander’s seat and prays to all the gods she doesn’t believe in that she doesn’t see what she knows she will. 

As she stands deathly still by the entrance, she wonders how she will ever find the strength to tell Edmont he has lost another son. 

The first to go are Krile and Y’shtola. 

Black Rose falls upon Dravania as the two of them pay what was meant to be but a brief visit to Idyllshire, and this time Shiori does not have the strength to see its wake with her own eyes. 

The funeral is somber. Shiori holds Alisaie and lets her hide her tears in her robes. She doesn’t cry, herself. She doesn’t know how. 

Once, she had thought she didn’t know what it was like to have sisters. But she remembers how Krile had been the one she would go to when G’raha showed up in her nightmares, and how Y’shtola had somehow always been there when what she needed was company and silence, and she realizes far too late that perhaps she _did_ know. 

Certainly, now, she knows what it is like to lose one. 

Urianger goes next, and Shiori mourns in ways she can’t quite put into words. 

They had never been particularly close, the two of them. Urianger had ever been a mystery, one she hadn’t been particularly inclined to solve, too fond of his half-truths and closely kept secrets for her taste. 

There’s a memory of him ingrained in her mind, however, and it’s the way he had looked after Moenbryda’s death. He felt familiar, in his grief, and she had briefly wondered if his secretiveness wasn’t unlike hers—one born out of cowardice. It was easier, to not let people in, be it to spare them the ugliness they’d find within or to spare _herself_ the pain when they inevitably left her behind. 

She wondered now why she never bothered to find out, when she still had time. 

When Thancred goes, he goes unexpectedly, abruptly, and alone. 

It's not Black Rose, this time. He gets himself shot through the head. If he had left in any other way Shiori thinks she might have been disappointed. 

She doesn’t attend the funeral. Instead, she finds the Garlean soldier who did him in, and buries her sword in his chest until she can no longer feel her hands. 

It does nothing to fill the emptiness in her heart. 

Tataru goes next. They don’t recover her body. 

Shiori makes tea, but it never tastes the same. 

She’s the one who finds them. 

They’re easy to spot—or perhaps she just can’t see anything but them, even among the countless corpses that cover the ground of Castrum Oriens. 

They’re together. Hand in hand, even in death. It makes her feel oddly warm. 

She sits, leans against a wall and brings their heads, cold and unmoving, onto her lap. She runs her hands through their hair and hums an old song her mother used to sing to her when she was a girl. She said it helped keep the bad dreams away. It never worked for her, but maybe it will for them. Gods know they deserve it. 

They’re buried in Sharlayan, next to their family. As she watches the coffins be lowered, Shiori considers throwing herself after them, to finally be gone into the earth together with the last pieces of her heart. 

She would have, she thinks, were it not for the fact Alphinaud and Alisaie would be terribly angry at her for doing so.

The path she follows is familiar, one she has walked a thousand thousand times, but today her whole body feels impossibly heavy. 

She lets herself slump to the floor when she arrives, leaning back against the headstone. She’s sure he doesn’t mind. 

“... It was my brother, yesterday,” she tells him. “And Lyse, the week before. Or maybe it was two weeks ago. I’ve stopped counting.” 

She sighs. Every breath takes monumental effort. 

“I did fight, you know. I survived. It availed me a whole lot of nothing. But I still did it, didn’t I? Because it was my _duty._ ” 

Her laugh feels bitter and metallic in her mouth. Gods, she’s so tired. 

“It’s fine if I rest now, isn’t it, old friend?” She asks, fingers digging lazily into the snow. “I’ve earned myself a little nap, if I say so myself.” 

The chilly Coerthan wind cuts through her face like a myriad knives, but feeling anything these days is a welcome sensation. 

“I’ll see you soon,” she says, and lets her eyes fall closed. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	12. day #11 — ultracrepidarian. azem&emet, 634 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #11 — ultracrepidarian.** /əltrəkrepəˈderēən, ʌl.trə.krep.ɪˈder.i.ən/: _noun,_ a person who expresses opinions on matters outside the scope of their knowledge or expertise.
>
>> “If all of us were—whole, once,” she asks him, “then was I—was I someone you knew?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> of course the one prompt where it seems a given to write about g'raha is the one i end up not doing so
> 
> no content warnings for this one, just some short grandpa angst and grapes

Azem does, indeed, come back with a basket of grapes under her arm. 

“Most eminent Emet-Selch!” She greets him with a wave of her free hand, smile perfectly nonchalant. “How kind of you to be here to welcome me.” 

“Do you have _any_ idea what you’ve done this time,” he rasps. 

“I’ve solved a pressing issue in the name of the Convocation, as is my duty,” she says, sitting on a nearby bench and popping a grape in her mouth. “Oh, those are delicious. Care to try?” 

“You stole Lahabrea’s concept—” 

“I _borrowed_ it from the Bureau, according to protocol—” 

“—and used a volcano’s aether to give it form, so that you could _beat_ it into submission—” 

“Beat is a most unkind word, wouldn’t you say? I like to call it _gentle persuasion—_ ” 

“—all without the Convocation’s approval, once again.” 

“But I did solve the matter at hand, didn’t I?” She grins, reaching for another godsdamned grape. “And I’m sure that as long as one of my _dearest friends_ vouches for me during the next meeting, there will be no trouble at all.” 

She smiles, fully aware that he will do so in spite of his complaining. He sighs. 

“Your recklessness will end us all, someday,” he says, moving to sit next to her, but she only laughs. 

“Not as long as I have you,” she answers, earnest and stupidly sincere, and he averts her eyes to instead grab one of her godsforsaken grapes and pop it into his mouth. 

Oh, hells. They really _are_ delicious. 

“But do tell me,” he asks, after a beat of silence, “the actual reason you went so far to stop that eruption.” 

“What do you mean?” 

“The people had already evacuated, there would be no lives lost—what was the point?” 

She blinks at him, looking entirely puzzled as to why he would even ask such a thing. 

“Their lives as they knew them would be lost, Hades,” she says, as if it’s a given. “To lose one’s homeland, everything they’d known for their whole lives—they would _survive_ , yes, but their lives would never be the same. And that’s— _that_ is worth protecting.” 

_Why risk so much for a people not your own,_ he actually wants to ask. _What is there beyond those borders that you value so much more than us._

“I see,” he says instead, and leaves it at that. 

_Her shade finds him, in a corner of the city._

_“If all of us were—whole, once,” she asks him, “then was I—was I someone you knew?”_

“How could you,” she spits, but doesn’t stop walking. “That the others could be this— _heartless_ , I should have expected, but you, Hades?” 

“It’s the only way!” He exclaims. “Why do you— _how_ can you value the lives of those people over those of your own kin? They’re not—” 

He knows he’ll regret those words as soon as she turns around. Her mask hides her eyes, but he knows he would only find ice in them, were he able to see. She jabs a finger into his chest, her voice pure venom. 

“Do not presume to know them,” she seethes, “you and the others, who spend your whole lives in this city, never bothering, never _caring_ to learn about those who dwell beyond it—you have no right to speak of them, or _for_ them, much less create a _god_ out of the lives of our own people to rule over the world they share with you.” 

“You’re leaving,” he says, “you’re truly going to—” 

“Yes,” she says, “and spare me your ultracrepidarianism. You know nothing of the people or the lands beyond Amaurot, Hades. And honestly—” she smiles, but it’s bitter, “you know nothing of me, either.” 

He watches as she walks away, frozen. Even as he calls her name, she does turn back. 

_“No,” he answers. “No, you weren’t.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	13. day #12 — tooth and nail. wolexarch, 1.9k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #12 — tooth and nail.** /tuθ ænd neɪl/: _adverb,_ with all of one's resources or energy; fiercely.
>
>> “My friend,” he says, mildly, “whatever you need of me, you need only ask. Even if it’s out of my scope of—”
>> 
>> Something in her snaps. 
>> 
>> “Will you _fuck me,_ Exarch?” She spits, and a part of her relishes the way his mouth parts in shock.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it has come. the day i write fucking heatfic.
> 
> does it make sense for lizards to have heats? does this happen in the canon™ timeline i have pictured for graha/shiori? i dont fucking know. this is pure, shameless porn set in whatever timeline is the horniest and it's you guys' problem now
> 
>  **content warnings:** hooded exarch, blindfolding and _very_ explicit sexual content lmao lets go

The door has barely closed when she slumps against it, every ilm of her body a blazing fire. 

This can’t be real. Not here, not _now_. It had been _years_ since she’d last felt like this—feverish and sweaty and with so much heat pooling between her thighs she fears she might _die._

She can’t think. She can’t breathe. It’s all she can do to hike her skirt up and shove her hand down her soaked smalls and slide two fingers inside herself while grinding desperately against her own palm but _gods_ , it’s not enough, it’s not nearly enough. 

In her mind’s eye she sees— _someone_ , roaming their hands over her body, their lips like a fire on the already scorching skin of her jaw, her throat, her breasts, her stomach, her— 

“Shiori?” 

Oh. Oh _hells_. 

The familiar voice comes from right outside her doors, so close she can almost hear it whispering filth against her skin, those hands pinning her down as he pistons his hips into her again and again and _again—_

“Are you alright? I was told you were feeling sick—” 

Oh she’s sick alright. She curls her fingers and her knees nearly buckle, the _smell_ of him right outside overwhelming all of her senses. 

Gods, she’s going to come. She’s going to come and he’s right there— 

“My friend—” 

It comes like a crashing wave, sets every nerve in her body on fire and makes her fall to the floor on her knees, gushing around her own fingers, clenching and quivering and only muffling the moan that threatens to spill out of her by biting down on her free hand until she draws blood. 

She blanks out for a long moment, gaze unfocused and an incessant ringing echoing in her ears. By the time she comes back to herself he’s knocking harder, voice growing increasingly more concerned. 

“Shiori, please open the door.” 

She brings herself back up on shaky legs, ruffles her clothes as best she can and opens the door, undoubtedly looking terribly disheveled, to the sight of a very concerned—as far as she can see, with the hood covering all but his lips—Crystal Exarch. 

“My friend,” he says, genuine concern etched in every word, “are you alright? When I was informed you were feeling unwell, I—” 

“I’m fine,” she grits, cutting him off. “It’s just—a fever. It’ll pass in no time.” 

Her climax gave her barely any semblance of relief, the heat already creeping through her body again, making her clench her thighs and her grip on the door so desperate her knuckles go white. Has he always smelled this _good?_

“If you’re certain,” he says, “but if you need anything—” 

“You can’t give me what I need,” she rasps. 

That gives him pause. 

“My friend,” he says, mildly, “whatever you need of me, you need only ask. Even if it’s out of my scope of—” 

Something in her snaps. 

“Will you _fuck me,_ Exarch?” She spits, and a part of her relishes the way his mouth parts in shock— _gods,_ those lips, they have no right to be this luscious—and in how his grip on his staff tightens. “Because I am in _heat_ , and what I need right now is to be fucked _senseless_. Will you do that, you who won’t even show me your face or tell me your _name?”_

He needs to leave. He needs to leave, before she drops to her knees right there and starts fucking herself again, begging for him to come and take her, fuck her, mark every ilm of her skin with teeth and nails and make her forget anything that isn’t the feeling of his cock inside of her. 

He stays silent. 

“I didn’t think so,” she says, and moves to close the door. 

His hand catches it before it closes. Shiori blinks. 

“Anything you need of me, you shall have,” he says, entering the room and closing the door behind him, voice and demeanor so _dark_ it sends fire straight to her loins. “But whatever happens—it must be on my terms.” 

“What terms,” she asks. Her fingers itch to reach out and pull him flush against her body, to reach into his robes and— 

“You cannot see me,” he answers. “That’s all I ask. Whatever else you want, I shall give to you. Most gladly.” 

She lets out a shaky breath, eyes hazy and gaze focused on those lips, right here, right in front of her, she could just—just— 

“Do you accept it,” he grits. 

“Yes,” she breathes, and then he pulls her _in_. 

It’s both agony and relief, the feeling of his lips on her. His kiss is heated and deep and _hungry_ , that of man who has been holding himself back for far too long. She whimpers into it, fingers pulling insistently at his robes and legs rubbing together, and the feeling of slick dripping down her thighs would be embarrassing were she not so _desperate._

“Strip,” he commands when they break apart, and she shudders. She can’t even blame the thought that she would obey any order he gave her with _that_ voice on her heat, immediately ridding herself of the stifling layers covering her body. 

“If you need me to stop, at any moment,” he says, undoing his sash, “you need only say so.” 

I won’t, I _can’t_ , she thinks, but only nods as he ties the fabric around her eyes and then—then his lips are on her again, his robes rubbing at her bare, impossibly sensitive skin and his hands sliding over her back and under her thighs, lifting her so effortlessly that all she can do is go limp and pliant in his arms. 

He sets her down on the bed and she whines as soon as he moves away, the loss of his warmth like a bath of ice water, reason slipping through her fingers as the fire low in her belly grows and grows until she can’t think anymore. 

“Please, _please_ , Exarch,” she hears herself beg, “I need—” 

He doesn’t answer, but she hears the shuffling of his clothes and then—then he’s on top of her again, finally _bare_ , kissing her lips and her jaw and her throat, hands palming her breasts and making her squirm. She can feel him against her, long and thick and _hard_ and she needs—needs— 

“Fuck me,” she says, “Fuck me fuck me _fuckme_ —” 

“ _Wicked white,”_ he growls, and then she’s being flipped around, bare backside in the air and trembling legs holding her hips over the edge of the bed and his hands are on her hips and the back of her head, pinning her down and— _gods, yes, like this_ — 

He pulls back for a single moment, the head of his cock caught in her slit, and then he _thrusts_. 

Shiori’s vision goes white. 

She thinks she screams, but she can’t tell anything beyond the _stretch_ , the friction and the pressure, that delicious _fullness_ she’s been craving so, so desperately, and it has never felt this _good_ , this _overwhelming_ , the blinding pleasure consuming every part of her body— 

He pulls back and plunges into her again, doubling over her body and moving to hold her wrists down beside her head. It’s so— _obscene_ , this position, being held down and _fucked_ by this man whose identity she doesn’t even know, his breath hot and heavy on the back of her neck, his chest pressed flush against her back and _gods_ he’s so good, every thrust steady and gorgeously smooth, bottoming out in every single one and making the back of her eyelids pulse _white_. 

“I’ve wanted this—wanted _you_ , for longer than you could _possibly_ imagine,” he groans, lips brushing her nape, “no one else, no soul in this star or any other could ever compare—” 

“ _Exarch—_ ” 

“I could _die_ here,” he continues, each thrust somehow going _deeper,_ “I could die here, buried inside you, and I would die the happiest man in all of Norvrandt—” 

He keeps going, whispering both filth and _worship_ into her skin, each stroke fresher and rawer than the last, forcing moans and half-screams out of her until her throat is sore and her breath erratic, lungs barely able to keep up with his rhythm, the toe-curling push and pull of his cock, spreading her open and taking her and _ruining_ her. 

“Tell me how it feels,” he demands, lips pressing down on her shoulder and _biting._

“It feels—so _good_ , Exarch, I—” 

“Do you want me to come inside you,” he asks, voice gravelly and thick, whispers the words right on her skin. “Do you want to feel it inside you, feel it dripping down your thighs?” 

Oh _gods_ _above_. 

He chuckles darkly, a direct contrast to the gentle kiss he drops on her back. “Don’t tell me you’re getting _shy,”_ he whispers, “you, who begged a man whose face or name you don’t know to come in here and _fuck you senseless—”_

He quotes her own words back to her and punctuates each of them with a thrust, then does it again and again and again and again until she loses count, each stroke harder and smoother and _better_ than the last. She tries to talk but her throat is sore with the sounds that escape from it, the whimpers and the moans and the _screams_ , all semblance of reason lost in the storm of their shared pleasure. 

She can tell he’s close by the way his hips stutter, his breath becoming more erratic where his lips brush against her skin, hot and heavy and _delightful_. 

“Say it, Shiori,” he both demands and begs, voice shaking with the effort of his thrusts, “tell me—” 

She can feel it coming, coiling low in her stomach and spreading through her whole body like waves. “Come inside me,” she gasps, “ _Please_ come inside me, I want to feel it—feel _you—_ ” 

He _growls_ at that, low and hard and _feral_ , thrusting one, two, three more times before he comes, spills hot and deep into her core, filling her, claiming her, hips flush against her own as he shakes and moans and Shiori’s world _shatters._

She comes _hard,_ pushed over the brink with no ceremony, no preamble, all consuming and overwhelming. She feels herself sob and beg and quiver and shake, his name—his _title—_ on her lips until she can’t breathe, until all she can feel is white-hot pleasure, throbbing through her body unbidden and _unending_. 

She floats there for a long moment, distantly aware of his hands caressing her hair, his lips whispering soft words of comfort as she comes down from her peak, a wonderful warmth rolling through her. Finally sated, if only for a moment. 

She whimpers when he pulls out, feels his come spill out and her whole body flush. He moves her gently, sets her down on the bed and lays by her side, holding her close. She still has his sash around her eyes, but there’s so much _affection_ in the gesture itself she fears what she might find in his gaze, were she able to look. 

“Do you feel better?” 

She chuckles. “Very, yes. I had no idea you could be so _filthy_ , though.” 

He fidgets, and she suspects if she could see him right now, he would be blushing. “I seem to have… very little control over myself, when it comes to you. Pray do not make me explain why it is so.” 

“I won’t,” she says, “as long as you give me what I want.” 

“What is it?” 

She simpers, turning her head towards him. 

“ _More_ ,” she says, and lets him pull her in. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i don't know what came over me, but thank you for reading LMAO  
> you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	14. day #13 — longanimity. wol&ardbert, 906 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #13 — longanimity.** /lɒŋ gəˈnɪm ɪ ti/: _noun,_ the patient endurance of hardship, injuries, or offense.
>
>> “You’re lonely, aren’t you,” he says. “You’re not _alone,_ but you’re lonely.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i intended for this to be platonic, but i guess it can be read however you want. some implied wolexarch at the end because i'm me.
> 
> no content warnings for this one, just a sad ghost and an emotionally constipated lizard

“Can’t sleep?” 

The question nearly makes her drop the cup in her hand, in spite of this being far from the first time Ardbert appears out of seemingly nowhere and scares her half to death. She has an impulse to tell him to _knock_ or something of the sort, but then she remembers. Oh, well. 

“It used to be a recurring problem,” she answers instead, “I thought it had passed, but coming here has been giving me some trouble again.” 

“What ails you?” 

“If I told you, we’d be here all night.” 

“As if I have somewhere to be.” 

She laughs, but she doesn’t answer. She can feel Ardbert’s eyes on her, though her own stay on the night sky. It has always soothed her, the sight of it. How convenient, that her room has such a wonderful view of it—and of the forests of Lakeland. She supposes she should thank the Exarch for that. 

“You don’t confide in them either,” Ardbert says, after a moment. “Your Scions, I mean.” 

“I suppose I don’t.” 

“Why?” 

“There are… things,” she answers, stirring her tea, “that they wouldn’t—couldn’t, perhaps—understand. Things that come with being the Warrior of Light. Or _Darkness,_ now.” 

Ardbert hums in understanding. 

“You’re lonely, aren’t you,” he says. “You’re not _alone_ , but you’re lonely.” 

It stings. More than she wants to admit. 

Shiori stays silent. There’s a deep, ugly part of her that— _envies_ Ardbert. How nice it must have been, she thinks, to have people who could truly understand this burden; share it with you, even. How nice it must have been, to not be alone. 

Yet how badly must it have hurt, to lose all of them at once. Perhaps she is better off being alone, in the end. 

“Do you miss them,” she asks. She doesn’t say who. He knows. 

Ardbert stays silent. Shiori sips her tea, and does not look at him. 

“Always,” he says, after a long moment. 

Something in his voice makes her heart ache, and not for the first time she feels a rush of shame for feelings as envious as she does. She finishes her tea in silence and places the cup by the windowsill. She supposes if there’s anyone who can understand what she feels, surely it must be him. 

“It’s not just because they can’t understand,” she confesses, quietly, “it’s because I don’t _want_ them to understand.” 

She sighs. It irritates her, this feeling—this want for companionship and comfort, mixed with the loathing for burdening others. She’s always been good at burying her emotions, but not so much at making sense of them. 

“I didn’t want to be a hero, when I started. I just wanted to be _strong_. But before I knew it there were—people, so many of them, clinging to me for hope and protection and _salvation_. It’s—” she sighs, takes a deep breath. “That sort of burden—I don’t _want_ them to understand it. I couldn’t wish it upon anyone.” 

“The burden needn’t be so heavy if you choose to share it.” 

“If only that was as simple as all the fetching I do for people.” 

That makes him laugh, shoulders shaking in tandem with it, and then—then his arm brushes against hers, and for a brief moment she feels _warmth._

Ardbert stiffens as if shocked. 

“You—felt that?” 

“... Yes.” 

He stays perfectly still, holding his arm where it had touched her, eyes fixed ahead. 

“Ardbert,” she says, careful, “do you want me to touch you?” 

“ _Please.”_

She reaches up to cup his face, as soft and gentle as she can be, and Ardbert closes his eyes and _melts_ into her touch. There’s no ardor in it—just a pure, almost childish need for human warmth. To spend so many years without being able to touch or speak to someone—she can’t fathom it. 

“It has been too long, hasn’t it,” she asks, “since someone’s touched you.” 

He chuckles, bitter and self-flagellating. “Far too long.” 

Lonely people, the both of them. 

“Come here,” she says, moving towards the bed. Ardbert follows silently, looking a little dazed. 

She slips under the covers and lies down, scoots towards the wall and holds her blanket up, a silent invitation. Ardbert balks. 

“You—” 

“The burden needn’t be so heavy if you choose to share it,” she smiles wryly. “Come on, Ardbert. But please do take off some of that armor.” 

He still looks dumbfounded, but follows her command anyway, lying down beside her silently. She reaches to touch him again, a gentle hand on his cheek, and he sighs. 

“Are you sure this is alright?” He asks. “Your lord Exarch would be most jealous, I would think.” 

“If he cared to warm my bed, then perhaps I wouldn’t be so lonely,” she says. “Besides, he can’t actually see you, even if he tries to spy on me in my sleep.” 

“So you do care for him.” 

“It’s complicated.” 

“I’m sure.” 

“Turn around,” she tells him. He blinks at her for a moment, but complies. She scoots forward and throws an arm around his waist, pressing her chest to his back. 

Ardbert tenses. “You don’t have to do this,” he says. 

“It’s fine,” she says, “I promise I won’t tell anyone you like being the little spoon.” 

“Has anyone ever told you you can be quite aggravating,” he deadpans. 

She laughs. “A few times, yes,” she says, eyelids beginning to feel too heavy for comfort. “Goodnight, Ardbert.” 

“... Goodnight, Shiori.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading~ you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	15. day #14 — part. wolgraha, 1.1k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #14 — part.** /pɑːrt, pɑːt/: _noun,_ some, but not all of something; to some extent; partly.
>
>> Raha loves to tease. To have control.
>> 
>> But there’s a part of him that likes relinquishing it just as much, and she’d be lying if she said she didn’t enjoy it.  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> when you don't have any ideas for the day's prompt, just do porn
> 
>  **content warnings:** explicit sexual content, very very soft femdom

G’raha likes taking care of her. 

That was easy enough for Shiori to figure. He’s eager to please, likes pinning her hips down to the bed as he licks and sucks and works his fingers inside of her until she has to push him off, quivering and oversensitive as he rests his head on her thigh, cheeks and chin covered with her slick. He likes the feeling of her nails running down his back as he fucks into her, likes to whisper filth in her ear and to stop moving when she’s about to come just to make her beg for it, for him. 

He loves to tease. To have control. 

But there’s a part of him that likes relinquishing it just as much, and she’d be lying if she said she didn’t enjoy it. 

“You look really pretty like this, you know,” she mutters, bare thighs bracketing his face, fingers running lazily through his hair. “Such a good, pretty boy, aren’t you, Raha?” 

Raha licks his lips and fidgets under her. It’s probably a little difficult for him to breathe in this position, with her weight resting nearly entirely on his chest, but he had confessed after some spluttering that he _really_ likes it when she rides him with her hands against his chest, leaning forward and making the air rush out of his lungs. She doesn’t move. 

There’s the briefest flash of hesitation in his expression before he nods, turning his gaze shyly to the side as she moves to gently rub his ears. "Yes," he says, eyes fluttering closed. 

"Do you want to eat me out, Raha?" 

He nods. He’s a lot less talkative, when he’s like this. So pliant. _Obedient_ , for once _._

"Look at me." 

She tugs at his hair, forcing him to look up. His eyes are a little glassy and unfocused, cheeks flushed a pretty shade of red and hair mussed. He looks a little—debauched. It only makes her feel hungrier. 

“Shiori,” he breathes, squirming a little underneath her. 

“What.” 

She scoots a little backwards, folds leaving a wet trail on his bare, flushed chest. Gods, he’s _burning_ , but it still feels cold against her skin. Raha lets out a little whimper that goes straight to her loins. 

She leans back and trails her fingers down his chest, rubs her own slick against his skin then drags them over her folds. His eyes follow her every move, tongue flicking out the slightest bit over his lips. 

“What do you want,” she asks, fingers circling her clit lazily as he watches, entranced. “Use your words, Raha.” 

He shifts, hands sliding down her back and over her thighs, pressing insistently at her hips. 

“Sit on me,” he pleads, voice croaky. Shiori shudders. 

She shuffles up the bed and raises herself on her knees, letting him pull her thighs apart. Raha sucks in a sharp breath when she hovers just above his chin, his tongue poking out again, sitting prettily against his lower lip. Eager. 

She waits. He stares at her, confused, then realization flicks over his face. 

“Please,” he whispers. 

“That’s better,” she says, smiling, then lowers her hips. 

His mouth is warm and wet, tongue flicking greedly as soon as he tastes her, his hands moving to her waist and hoisting her down. “ _Fuck,”_ she whispers, one hand clinging to the headboard and the other threading through his hair as he presses his tongue flat against her. Raha moans, the vibrations of it making her legs tremble. “Gods, your _mouth.”_

From below he stares up at her, hazy and heavy-lidded. He looks like he’s in heaven, eyes squeezing shut when her thighs squeeze tight against his head. She twists her fingers in his hair, presses his head back against the mattress and starts rocking her hips. 

Raha’s eyes flutter open, lips parting, soft and pliant underneath her. He lets her grind down on his tongue, one hand sliding down the small of her back, two fingers further down still to press inside her. He fucks them in fast and hard, her own hips starting to thrust faster of their own accord, holding him still as she uses that pretty mouth— 

“Raha,” she gasps, breath growing more and more rapid, “that feels so good, baby, so _good—_ ” 

Her hips stutter when he presses his lips together and sucks at her clit, draws it between his lips and runs tight little circles around it with his tongue. Shiori feels it building, her whole body tingling, starting all the way down her toes and travelling up, her stomach and thighs tensing as her clit throbs. 

Her climax rips through her _hard_ , body going numb and fingers twisting in Raha’s hair so hard she’s sure it must hurt, but he only moans. She can feel herself _gushing_ , hears how wet Raha’s fingers fucking into her get. He doesn’t stop, keeps fucking her through the aftershocks, eyes smug as she shakes above him. 

When the sensitivity becomes too much and she lifts her hips off of his face. A line of her slick connects her folds to his lips, and when he leans up to lick at her one last time she nearly shrieks, grabs his hair with a tight fist and pushes his head down. 

“Brat,” she heaves, throat a little sore. 

He smiles at her. “Sorry,” he says, rubs his fingers over his lips and cheeks and licks her slick off of them. Fucking hells. “You just taste good.” 

She lets go of his hair so she can clamber off him, laying down to catch her breath. Raha rolls over as soon she does, pressing her into the mattress with such a boyish desperation it makes her smile. She tugs at his hair so he comes up to press their lips together. Gods, he tastes like her. 

“Shiori,” he whispers, burying his face on the crook of her neck, rutting against her thigh like a teenager. “I want—” 

She hums, stroking his hair lazily. “What do you want, love?” 

“To fuck you,” he says, pressing kisses down the line of her throat, dragging his teeth along the sensitive skin and _sucking_. 

“Yeah?” she giggles, but it dissolves into a moan when he bites down the curve of her shoulder, soothes the sting with a brush of his tongue. “That’s what you want?” 

“ _Yes,_ ” he huffs against her skin. “Can I, please?” 

She giggles, runs her fingers through his hair, down his shoulders and his back. _Cute,_ she thinks, even as she spreads her legs and lets him settle between them, feels his length press hot and hard against her. 

“Of course, love,” she whispers. “Of course.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	16. day #15 — ache. wolexarch, 1.3k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #15 — ache.** /āk, eɪk/: _noun,_ a continuous or prolonged pain; an emotion experienced with painful or bittersweet intensity.
>
>> He finds her in the Quadrivium.
>> 
>> It’s raining. Pouring, actually, most of the people in the Crystarium having retired to their homes or to places they might find shelter. But she is here, under the open sky, alone and drenched, and she is _dancing._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello i am back on "pieces that i will likely recycle for my longfic" bullshit
> 
> this should be set immediately after the scions' return from the meeting with the real minfilia in amh araeng, but my memory is bad so give me some slack. no content warnings for this one.

He finds her in the Quadrivium. 

It’s raining. _Pouring,_ actually, most of the people in the Crystarium having retired to their homes or to places they might find shelter. But she is here, under the open sky, alone and drenched, and she is _dancing._

It’s a slow thing—a gentle sway from side to side, an occasional spin, her arms slightly outstretched at her sides and the long skirt of her dress twirling in tandem. Her eyes are closed but she tilts her head upwards, raindrops rolling down her face, her hair, her clothes, drenching it and making it cling to the soft arches of her body. 

It’s a beautiful sight to behold. It is also excruciatingly lonely. 

“Shiori,” he calls out, but his voice is drowned out in the downpour. He does it again, louder, and she stops mid spin, finally noticing him standing there. 

Then she smiles. 

“Exarch!” she calls out, waving at him. “Come join me!” 

He blinks. 

“My friend,” he says mildly, “I do not think you’re immune to the cold just yet.” 

“Perhaps you should come then, to make sure I am warm.” 

He’s thankful, far from the first time, for the hood covering his face. Does she do this on purpose? 

She giggles, but it feels mirthless. “Come on, old man,” she says. “Live a little.” 

It’s plain to see she has no intention of leaving, and he has never had the willpower (or the desire, for that matter) to deny her anything, and he’s certainly not about to muster it now. He sighs, resigned, and steps forward into the downpour, his robes immediately drenching under it. Shiori laughs, delighted. 

“Tell me, Exarch,” she asks when he approaches her, “can you dance?” 

He coughs. “I—That is not one of my skills, I’m afraid.” 

“Truly? Not even a simple waltz?” she hums thoughtfully. “I guess I’ll have to show you, then.” 

She reaches for his hand and pulls him forward before he has a chance to react, intertwining their fingers and pressing her chest flush against his own. He tries, very pointedly, to not stare at the way the rain rolls down the patch of bare cleavage her dress exposes. He fails miserably. 

“My friend—” 

“Indulge me,” she says, reaching for his other hand and placing it on the small of her back. She’s so close. Not close enough. He can’t tell anymore. “Please.” 

He prays to every god he can name for her to play this as a joke, lest he lose the last few bits of sanity he still manages to hold onto when she’s this close to him. They don’t answer. 

“... We have no music.” 

She laughs, his sorry attempt at an excuse falling flat. “We’ll be fine. Follow my lead.” 

She begins to move and he follows. They’re not dancing as much as they’re stepping side to side, Shiori humming a song he doesn’t recognize under her breath, eyes closed. Her long white locks stick to her skin, and he resists the urge to reach up and brush them away from her face. 

It’s grown so long, her hair. How much has he missed in the time he’s been away, asleep? He’s lived far more than hundred years at this point, yet he feels like he hasn’t seen even a fraction of what she has in the last four. So much about her has changed. She’s a little calmer, a little more mature. A lot more tired. 

She still has her old tells, however. The smallest bit of tension in her brow, the way her shoulders are just a little more stiff than usual. And, well, the way she was dancing alone in the middle of downpour. Something’s wrong, he can tell. 

“This isn’t like you.” 

She opens her eyes. Her lips curl around a smile, but her gaze is terribly melancholic. She tilts her head innocently, as if she has no idea what he’s talking about. 

“Whatever do you mean?” she asks. For all the parts of her that have changed, this one hasn’t. Never letting anyone in. Never baring her heart. 

“Something ails you,” he says. It’s not a question. She casts her eyes down, smile growing wistful, but stays silent. 

She continues to sway the both of them to this inaudible song. He waits. 

“Minfilia’s gone,” she says after a long moment, so quietly he barely catches it. “For good, now.” 

_Ah._

“I’ll never see her again. I’ll never hear her voice, or speak to her. I thought I had already let go, but I haven’t, have I? I never do. And it hurts. It really, really hurts.” 

She chuckles, but it’s bitter and self-deprecating. Her eyes are red and misty and he realizes with an ache that there may be a reason she chose to hide in the rain. 

“Shiori,” he whispers. 

“And I can’t talk to the one person who would understand, the one person who needs me most right now, because we said terrible things to each other back in Il Mheg and now we’re not on speaking terms at all. And I can’t bring myself to go talk to him, because I’m afraid. Afraid he won’t forgive me.” 

_Thancred_ , he thinks. He’d noticed they haven’t spared a glance towards one another since their return from the Faerie Kingdom, but even the Scions seem disinclined to explain what exactly happened. He’s important to her, he has noticed, and a deep, ugly part of him twists in a jealousy he has no right to feel. 

“So I came here. I came here because the rain and the earth remind me of home, and I danced because it reminds me of my mother. And I asked you to join me because I am terribly, terribly lonely, so much that the company of a man who won’t tell me anything about himself feels _soothing_.” 

It stings. She still smiles, even as the wavering in her voice makes it clear that she’s crying. 

“If there’s anything I can do for you—” 

“Will you kiss me?” 

He stops in his tracks. 

She releases his hand and moves to loop her arms around his shoulders, and he instinctively brings his hands down to her hips. Closer, impossibly closer. He can feel it—her warmth, the swell of her breasts against his chest. A few more ilms and he could feel the softness of her lips, as well. 

“My friend,” he whispers. He does not move. _Coward,_ a voice inside of him mutters. 

“Will you kiss me?” she repeats quietly, looking at him through her long lashes. “Will you bring me to my room and warm my bed, Exarch? Will you undress me and touch me and make me so tired that I can no longer feel this ache that has consumed me for years? Will you do that for me?” 

His grip on her hips tightens painfully. She smiles, crooked and vulturous, but the twinge of sadness in her eyes remains. She leans forward the slightest bit, their lips now barely a couple ilms apart. _You_ _don’t deserve this_ , he thinks to himself, even as his eyes begin to flutter closed. He doesn’t deserve this, could never deserve this. Yet so many years he has dreamed about this, about _her—_

And then she stops. 

In a second, she’s out of his arms. 

“Forgive me,” she says, now a full fulm away from him, gaze pointed towards the ground. “I am tired and hurt and, well,” she laughs, acrid. “I never learned how to deal with my emotions in a— _healthy_ way. I meant you no offense.” 

She rubs at her arm with one hand, gaze shifted to the side—to anywhere but him. The lack of her warmth feels colder than the rain rolling down his body. 

“Shiori—” 

She turns to him and smiles. He recognizes this one—practiced and rehearsed, the one he would most often see on her face back when they first met. “Thank you for indulging me, Exarch,” she says, offering him a brief, dispassionate bow. “Have a good evening.” 

She leaves, and he watches her retreating back not unlike he had done many, many years ago. As the rain falls around him, cold and merciless, he wonders why the passing of centuries have not made him any less of a coward. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! have you listened to [i.o.i.'s downpour?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCKOWQ-_CYc) you should.
> 
> you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	17. day #16 — lucubration. wolexarch, 1k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #16 — lucubration.** /lü-kyə-ˈbrā-shən/: _noun,_ laborious or intensive study, work, or thought, especially at night.
>
>> G'raha works late, and Shiori worries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i did it, y'all. i wrote fluff.
> 
> no content warnings for this one.

G’raha sits hunched over another dusty tome, the words blurring incomprehensibly under the dim light of his personal quarters. He blinks the bleariness out of his eyes and tries to force himself to focus on the pages again. He’s close, he’s so close. He knows the answer lies somewhere in here, but every time he feels he’s about to reach it, it slips through his fingers. 

When he reads the same paragraph for the fifth time without absorbing a single word, he sighs and slams the tome closed in frustration, burying his face in his hands. By his fumbling hand are the Scions trapped in this shard with no way to return, the link between their souls and bodies weakening with every passing second, and his incompetent, useless self can’t even find a way to see them safely home— 

“Please don’t take your anger out on the tome,” a voice behind him says, “it has done nothing to deserve this treatment.” 

He turns to see Shiori walking in, a silver tray in her hands. He hadn’t even heard the door open. Yet as much as he would appreciate her presence any other time, right now he just feels irritated. 

“If you’re here to persuade me to rest—” 

“You know that’s the reason I am here,” she cuts him off, placing the tray down on the table. Tea, he notices, and some pastries, round and colourful; green, white and pink ones placed on top of a ceramic plate. 

“Shiori,” he sighs, “I really need to work.” 

“And you’ve done plenty of that, I’m sure. But you’ll help no one by working yourself into an early grave, Raha.” She moves the tome away and pours the tea in one of the cups. “Take a break. You know you’ll feel better.” 

She slides the cup towards him and he stares at it, sighing. “Please leave.” 

“No.” 

“Shiori.” 

“Drink, Raha.” She places the plate in front of him. “And eat. I know you’ve been skipping your meals lately.” 

“How can you be so calm?” he asks, frustration bubbling to the surface as she pulls a chair to sit beside him. “Your friends' lives could be forfeit if I don’t find a way for them to return, but you would rather I spend my time sipping tea rather than making sure they don’t _perish?”_

He raises his voice despite himself and regrets it as soon as he does, noticing the way she tenses ever so slightly. Gods, he’s so _tired_. But he can’t stop. He can’t fail her, fail _them_ , after all he’s done. He parts his lips to apologize, but Shiori speaks before he has the chance to. 

“I can be calm,” she says, placing a hand on his knee and looking right into his eyes, “because the man I love is brilliant and bright, and I am certain that by his ingenuity my friends will find the way back home.” 

He deflates, warmth and shame washing over him in equal measure. “Shiori—” 

“I _cannot_ be calm, however, when that same man is neglecting his health for their sake, as I would not soon see his life forfeit for the sake of theirs—or for any reason, mind you.” 

He fidgets, unable to look her in the eye. “I’m not going to _die,_ ” he says, dejected. 

“Then you had better eat and get some actual rest,” she says, smiling weakly. 

G’raha sighs, picks up the cup and sips his tea quietly as Shiori pours more into a second cup for herself. He grabs one of the round—dumplings?—and bites into it. It’s sweet and chewy, the flavor not familiar to him, but still quite delicious. 

“What’s this?” 

“Daifuku,” she answers, picking up one of the pink ones, “it’s a dessert from back home. My home, I mean.” 

_Oh._

“You made this for me,” he says, guilty. Here she was, at gods know what time of night, having made him tea and pastries, and he had yelled at her to leave. 

“And for my own sweet tooth. I haven’t had one of those in a while.” 

“I’m sorry I raised my voice at you.” 

“It’s fine, Raha.” 

“It’s not,” he says, “I often get so absorbed in my work that I forget everything else, be it my own health or the feelings of those who care for me, undeserving as I am. I’m sorry.” 

She sighs. “You’re not _undeserving,_ Raha,” she says, standing up and leaning over him to press a quick kiss to his lips, “but I guess I’ll forgive you if you come sleep with me.” 

He raises an eyebrow at her, smirking. 

“Not like _that!”_ she exclaims, the scandalized look on her face making him laugh. 

“Considering the things I’ve heard you say at certain times _,_ ‘tis quite amusing that you get so flustered by—” 

“Shut _up_ , old man. _”_

After he soothes her indignation with a few soft kisses and whispered half-apologies, she helps him out of his robes and joins him in his too small bed. He bundles her up in his arms like a doll, the thin fabric of her camise tickling his bare chest, and wonders, not for the first time, how could he possibly have gotten this lucky. 

“Thank you,” he whispers instead, leaving light, soft kisses across the top of her chest, a hand sliding smoothly up her side to cup one breast in his palm. He rubs it gently, and she shudders against him. 

“ _Behave_ ,” she chides, wiggling, but it loses its impact with the way she giggles. “You need _sleep_ , Raha.” 

“Make me tired, then,” he mutters, pressing his lips to her neck. 

“We both know you’d fall asleep halfway through it, the way you are right now,” she says. 

He snickers softly, withdrawing. She was right, he knew, his eyelids already feeling too heavy for comfort. “In the morning, then,” he says, grinning, and she rolls her eyes at him fondly. 

“Mm,” she hums, snuggling against him and eyes fluttering closed. “Go to sleep, Raha.” 

He closes his eyes and squeezes her up against himself, tight and warm. Lulled by the soft, rhythmic sound of her breathing, sleep comes easily. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading~ you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	18. day #17 — fade. wol&ardbert, 927 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #17 — fade.** /fād, feɪd/: _verb,_ to lose color, brightness, or strength; to grow faint and disappear.
>
>> “You’re reading my correspondence now?” she snaps, an odd sort of shame washing over her. Ardbert shakes his head.
>> 
>> “I didn’t need to,” he says, not looking at her. “I’ve watched you enough to know those are farewells.”  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was my original idea for "longanimity" and i was just going to scratch it, but then i spent 2 hours rewatching cutscenes and ended up too deep in my ardbert feelings.
> 
> set sometimes between rak'tika and tomra, post "longanimity", with liberties taken regarding the speed of the wol's transformation. no content warnings.

Shiori barely makes it to the window before she doubles over, retching. It feels not unlike a myriad knives ripping her throat open from inside out, body convulsing painfully and flashes of white overwhelming her vision. She doesn’t know how long it lasts—it feels both like a few short seconds and several long hours, but by the time it’s over and she slumps, boneless, to the floor, she feels more exhausted than she has felt after killing actual gods. 

She stays here for gods know how long until a familiar voice calls out to her. “You feeling alright?” it says. 

She blinks against the light of her own room—or just the light behind her own eyelids. She can’t tell. “Fantastic, actually,” she deadpans. 

Ardbert snickers. “I guess that was a bit daft.” 

He sits beside her, leaning against the windowsill. They stay there in silence for a long time, her pain slowly fading. It’s nice, she thinks, to have this sort of quiet company at times. Perhaps she should make more ghost friends. 

“Is this why you’ve been writing those?” 

Or perhaps not. 

“You’re reading my correspondence now?” she snaps, an odd sort of shame washing over her. Ardbert shakes his head. 

“I didn’t need to,” he says, not looking at her. “I’ve watched you enough to know those are farewells.” 

She ignores him, moving to stand up instead. Her legs feel like lead as she walks to her desk, the half finished letter on top of it feeling like a death sentence. She sighs and sits down, picks up the pen and continues to write, pointedly ignoring Ardbert’s eyes staring holes into her back. 

For a few long minutes the only sound in the room is that of her pen moving against the parchment, sharp and methodical. This one is for Alphinaud. The one for Alisaie is finished, folded in a corner of the desk. She’ll write her brother’s last. 

A hand on her shoulder makes her wrist stop moving. Her pen falters mid-word, a black blob of ink pooling underneath its tip. 

“Don’t,” she says. 

Ardbert sighs. “You don’t have to do this.” 

“And how would _you_ know?” she grits. His hand tenses for a brief moment where it rests on her shoulder. 

“Why give up in a fight you haven’t lost yet?” 

“I’m not giving up, Ardbert. I’m just—taking precautions.” 

“Precautions for your death.” 

“Yes,” she rasps. 

“You’re scared,” he says. “Of what?” 

_Of everything_ , she wants to say. Of the light, of what she could feel was happening to her. She saw two golden veins across her stomach in the mirror yesterday, and now she was afraid of losing control, of losing herself. She was afraid of _Hydaelyn._ And gods, she was afraid of dying, but she was even more afraid of getting to the point where she would _wish_ for it. 

“I don’t know,” she says instead. “I don’t know if I can do this. I can’t—I’m not sure I’m strong enough. Not anymore.” 

Not strong enough to contain the light. Still strong enough to become the Lightwarden that would end mankind. It would be funny if it didn’t make her want to vomit again. 

“You are,” he says, like there’s nothing he’s more sure of than that. “If anyone is, you are.” 

That’s what does it. She sees them drip down on the paper before she actually feels them. The tears come and all of a sudden they just won’t _stop_ , her shoulders trembling and her vision blurry. 

Ardbert stiffens. “Oh,” he says, “I didn’t mean to—” 

“It’s not you,” she whimpers, “it’s just—it’s been a lot—” 

_Gods, this is embarrassing,_ she thinks, but the tears don’t stop _._ Ardbert keeps standing by her side, hands hovering awkwardly in the air for a long while until he settles for—patting her in the head, like she’s a small child. 

It shocks her into laughter. 

“Oh my gods, Ardbert,” she half-sobs, half-wheezes. “Really.” 

“That—I was trying to _comfort_ you—” 

“I’m not twelve!” 

“Well I didn’t know what else to do!” 

They stare at each other for a long moment, and then they both break into fits of laughter. Her stomach hurts so much by the time they stop that she nearly forgets the pain of the light within her. 

“You should get some sleep,” says Ardbert. 

Shiori looks at the unfinished letter on the desk but nods, tired. There will be time, she supposes. Ardbert hovers nearby as she crawls into bed. 

“Don’t want to cuddle this time around?” she asks, grinning. 

He snickers. “No thank you,” he says. “You have a nice rest.” 

She hums in acknowledgement, settling down under the covers. 

“And Shiori?” 

“Hm?” 

“You don’t need those,” he says, nodding towards the desk, “because you still have the chance to say the things you want to say, while you’re here. While _they_ are here. Don’t waste it.” 

“Speaking from experience, are you.” 

He smiles, mirthless. “Perhaps a bit. I had someone I cared for, like you have that Exarch of yours. I wasted my chances, and I wouldn’t want you to waste yours.” 

Shiori splutters. “I don’t—” she sighs. “I don’t even know who he is, Ardbert.” 

“Yet you still feel the way you feel,” he says. “But I’ve said enough. I certainly shouldn’t be the one to give you love advice.” 

“Whatever advice you give me can’t be worse than Thancred’s.” 

He chuckles, shaking his head. “Goodnight, hero.” 

“‘Night, Ardbert,” she says, but he’s already faded into the night, leaving her alone with her thoughts and a too cold bed. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	19. day #18 — panglossian. wolexarch, 725 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #18 — panglossian.** /pænˈglɒsiən/: _adjective,_ characterized by or given to extreme optimism, especially in the face of unrelieved hardship or adversity.
>
>> “What’s the first thing you would do if you could go back?” she asks him, voice so quiet he barely catches it. “Home, I mean.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is stupidly fluffy and self indulgent. i just love them a lot.

“What’s the first thing you would do if you could go back?” she asks him, voice so quiet he barely catches it. “Home, I mean.” 

_Ah_ , he thinks. _There it is._ The question he has thought far too much about, but is still too afraid to answer. 

Shiori traces patterns into his bare chest with one finger, absentmindedly. He focuses on her touch and lets his mind wander. 

It’s rather panglossian of him to even consider the possibility of it happening, but he has nonetheless, and the answer to her question has always been on the tip of his tongue, taunting him, threatening to spill every time he catches her eyes and she looks at him like he’s something worth loving, every time she lets him tilt her chin up and press his lips to hers, every time she lets him bring her to bed and touch her, taste her, feel her until they’re both spent and sated. 

_I would marry you,_ is his answer; the honest one, the one he has spent far too much time thinking about. 

Admittedly, he already has the entire scenario planned out in his mind. The first thing he would do is go back home; introduce her to his mother, and just his mother. The rest of the tribe, well. He knows what they might say after seeing him with an Auri woman, and while he’s long past the point of caring for their opinions, he’s familiar with their scorn, and he’d sooner die than submit Shiori to it. 

His mother, however. She’d always wanted a daughter, and she’d always wanted him to be _happy_. He knows she would love Shiori. He knows. 

After that, he’d pay a visit to her brother. Alone, this time. 

He’d met Seiji only once, when he stubbornly followed Shiori on a trip to Ul’dah and ended up joining her and her brother at their dinner table, feeling impossibly awkward. _Just be good to her, yeah? As a friend or otherwise. She’s been hurt enough,_ Seiji had said to him back then, in a brief moment they were alone, and G’raha is painfully aware he has miserably failed at his one request. He’d apologize, promise him he would spend the rest of his life making her as happy as she could possibly be, and hope that he would forgive him. 

Then, and only then, he would take her to the shores of Lake Silvertear. It’s not the most romantic place, he knows, but it is where they’d first met, and he wouldn’t want to ask her anywhere else. And if she were to accept, then— _then_ he would marry her, in front of all their friends and families, would kiss her and carry her to bed and not let her leave for a fortnight. 

It’s nice to dream. 

“Raha?” 

But he can’t answer, can he? He can’t promise her a future, with this body of his. If he can call it _his_ at all. 

“I suppose I would visit my mother,” he answers instead. A half-truth, at least. It does nothing to ease the guilt. 

Shiori hums thoughtfully, the finger on his chest coming to a halt. “What’s she like?” 

“Kind,” he says. “Beautiful. Patient, as is a given, with a son like me.” 

She giggles. He wishes he could bottle the sound and get drunk on it. “I’d love to meet her,” she says. 

“Me too,” he whispers, bundling her up in his arms. “Me too.” 

  
*  


  


“Stop right there, mister,” he hears as soon as he tries to sit up. “You are _not_ supposed to be moving yet.” 

He sighs, but falls back into bed. “I feel fine, Shiori,” he mutters. “Better than I have in centuries, in fact.” 

“Better than when you had a half-crystallized body is hardly a high standard, Raha,” she says, sitting down by his bedside. “Just rest, all right?” 

He hums, reaching to hold her hand and thumb lazily at the knuckle of her ring finger. “When the lady deems me fit to _move_ ,” he says, snickering when she rolls her eyes at him, “would she perhaps join me to pay a visit to my mother?” 

“Oh,” she blinks in surprise, but her face soon splits into a smile. “Of course.” 

He smiles back, heart swelling inside this new old body of his. It truly is wonderful to dream. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading <3 you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	20. day #19 — where the heart is. wolexarch, 1k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #19 — where the heart is.** /(h)wer ðə' hɑːrt ɪz/: _idiom,_ where one's emotions, memories or affections lie; a place one feels connected to, emotionally.
>
>> “What do you want?” he asks. Always, always asks, even when he knows the answer, knows this is the only use he’ll ever be for her.
>> 
>> “Make me forget,” she whispers, quiet and quivery. “Please.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another sad AU thing. maybe the same timeline as "tooth and nail"? who knows!!
> 
>  **content warnings:** explicit sexual content, blindfolding

It was easier like this. 

“Exarch—” 

Easy, to press her up against the wall, to grab her hips and grind forward, to let her know just exactly what she did to him, what he would be doing to _her_ soon enough. 

_Don’t call me that,_ he wants to say. _Not tonight, please._ But he hasn’t earned the right to ask her anything, not after what he has taken from her, what he will still take. Instead, he lets his fingers trail up her chest, over the smooth line of her throat, tips her chin up and lets her head fall back against his shoulder, her eyes already covered with a soft, dark cloth. 

“Suck,” he says, fingers resting against her lips. Watches, entranced, as they part and let him in, feels her tongue curl around them, soft and warm and _wet_ , groans low in his throat when the image of her on her knees, pretty lips wrapping around his cock instead, crosses his mind. 

She gets his fingers wet for him, releases them with an obscene, wet _pop_ , and he immediately moves to thumb aside her underwear and plunge two fingers right into her core. Gods, she’s soaked, slick squirting around his hand as he moves, strokes her from the inside, spreads his fingers and curls them just the way she likes, just the way that makes her legs tremble and knees buckle. 

This he knows, at least. He knows not how to stop her tears or how to soothe the ache in her heart, but this— 

“What do you want?” he asks. Always, always asks, even when he knows the answer, knows this is the only use he’ll ever be for her. 

“Make me forget,” she whispers, quiet and quivery. “Please.” 

This, he knows. 

He carries her to the bed, sets her down on the mattress and crawls over her body, kissing down her neck and leaving her skin blazing. His hands scrape her stomach, her sides, up and up to the swell of her breasts to cup them and _squeeze_ greedily, swallowing the moans that spill out of her mouth like they’re the only thing that could ever quench this torturous thirst he feels low in his throat. 

He starts trailing kisses down her stomach but she stops him, wrapping her legs tight around his shoulders. 

“No,” she whimpers, “just—just fuck me, please—” 

He complies silently, leaning back to rid himself of his robes, and she turns around to lay on her stomach, cheek on the bed and backside in the air, and he curses under his breath. 

It had been positively _maddening_ to see her in this position, the first few times. It still was, in fact—as long as he forgot the times he had tried to have her on her back, had wanted to watch her squirm and take him so, so well, but she refused. He had realized, then, that she didn’t want him to _see_ her. Wanted to keep this _arrangement_ of theirs fleeting and impersonal. 

It was the only way he could have her—detached and anonymous. But have her he would. Anything she would give him was more than he deserved. 

He buries the thoughts and shifts behind her, the bed dipping under his knees, and then the head of his cock is at her entrance and he lets go of everything and just— _thrusts_. 

Everything between his ears turns to static. 

He doubles over, the shift in angle making him go impossibly _deeper,_ her clamping around him so tight it’s all he can do to not come on the spot. He stills, only for a moment, but she bucks back against him, insistent, _impatient_ , angling her hips for better access and he just—loses it. 

She asked him to make her forget, and he did—fucked her to forget, fucked her to _hurt,_ fast and hard and _merciless,_ until she was clutching at the sheets mindlessly and muffling her cries in the fabric, the twitch and fluttering of her walls making it impossibly hard for him to blink his vision clear. There was nothing in his mind but her, her, _her—_ here, underneath him, squirming and moaning and clenching around his cock— 

“I—” she gasps, “Exarch, I—” 

_Say my name, say my name_ , he pleaded, begged in his mind. _Call for me, beg me, say you want **me** —_

“Feel it,” he rasps through clenched teeth, “Feel me— _come for me—_ ” 

She does, with a desperate, sharp cry, back arching and sheets mussing under her fists and there’s nothing he can do but follow, every nerve in his body vibrating and set aflame, spilling hot and deep inside her. 

He lets go of her hips when the room stops swimming, and she slumps down the mattress, boneless and still quivering. He strokes her hair for a moment before he brings himself up on shaky legs to grab a warm washcloth and clean her, tuck her naked body underneath the covers. 

She lies there silently on her back as he gets dressed again, doesn’t move even as he sits down beside her to remove the blindfold around her eyes. They’re bloodshot, dried tear stains adorning her cheeks. He runs a gentle hand down the side of her face and over the curve of her neck, but she doesn’t look at him, gaze instead fixed on the ceiling. 

“If you need anything—” 

“Leave.” 

His hand stills right above her chest, over where her heart is. Or was, perhaps, before _he_ plucked it out of her ribcage, took her friends from her one by one, forced her into another fight she didn’t ask for, made her witness more horrors she never should have witnessed. His hand, the one who ended up pushing her over the edge, to this. 

“Everything I have done—” 

“Leave, Exarch,” she whispers, eyes squeezing shut like his very presence _pains_ her, somehow. “Please. I can’t _talk_. Not tonight.” 

He obeys, this time, stands up and leaves quietly, a muttered _goodnight, my friend,_ under his breath before the door closes behind his back. 

She would live. That, he would make sure of. 

Would it be enough? 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	21. day #20 — eccedentesiast. wolexarch, 1.3k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #20 — eccedentesiast.** /ekədɛn-ti-æst/: _noun,_ one who hides their true feelings behind a happy attitude or smile.
>
>> “Could you _love_ her, knowing what I am?” she asks. He doesn’t breathe. “Would you still care for her, if you knew the deepest, ugliest parts of her soul—those she hides with smiles and pleasantries?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and here’s another sort-of-bad-timeline AU
> 
> there’s a specific line from the level 50 DRK job quest that lives in my mind rent free. i’m sure you can guess which it is. 
> 
> **content warnings:** mild violence, discussed sexual content

There had always been something different about Shiori when she picks up the sword. 

Sometimes it was just recklessness. Charging ahead a little too fast, a little too carelessly, getting herself hurt and smiling about it even as Alphinaud chided her while healing her wounds. Other times it was a little—darker. It was a crooked smile as she buried her sword in an enemy’s chest with barely concealed glee, the look of _ecstasy_ on her face when she licked the blood off her lips, bathed in it like it was a spring shower. 

Then sometimes it was... this. Her kneeling on the ground, laughing even as she bled more than any _living_ person could possibly bleed, the gaping wound on her stomach painting the royal blue of her top a deep black. This time it’s him kneeling before her, muttering _gods, shiori, are you alright_ even as it was obvious she was _not_ , but she laughed and laughed and laughed. 

_You’ve got about six seconds to heal me_ , she says, and then she passes out. 

He does heal her. She comes back like nothing happened, all pleasant smiles and _thank you, Exarch,_ and she doesn’t talk about it. 

She’s slipping. 

He can feel it, _they_ can feel it, but for once he hasn’t the faintest idea what to do. Was it him, who had pushed her to this point? Was summoning her to yet another fight that isn’t hers, in a world that is not her own the last push that tipped her off the edge? 

He can’t answer. None of them can. And it keeps happening, slowly but surely. 

One day, she doesn't come back. 

*

__

_If this is how it must be, then so be it. But know that when you tire of this charade, I shall be here—waiting to take the reins._

*

It’s been two weeks. 

“Exarch,” _Shiori_ greets, grinning, as soon as she opens the door. “To what do I owe the honor?” 

She steps aside and he walks in, quietly. It almost feels familiar, this scene. 

“I had hoped to speak with you alone,” he answers, moving to sit down on the sofa when she gestures to it. 

She moves towards the table to pour him a glass of water. “I’m all ears,” she hums, chipper and melodic and so, so _wrong._

“Thank you,” he says. “Then pray allow me to speak plain. _What_ are you?” 

She freezes where she stands with her back to him, the very air around them growing stagnant. She sets the flagon down on the table with a dull _thud._

“No pleasantries, then,” she muses, the cheerful tint on her voice still there, but now with a hint of bitterness to it. “Ere I answer your so thoughtfully put question, my lord, pray allow me to regale you with one of my own. What does it _matter_ to you what I am?” 

She turns, leans back against the table and regales him with impossibly icy eyes. She still smiles. It feels predatory. 

He swallows. “What do you mean?” 

“Exactly what I said,” she says, tilts her head to the side innocently. “You who summoned us here to fight your battles—why do _you_ care who or _what_ I am, as long as I serve your purpose? Have I not done so _masterfully_ , especially after _she_ let me take the reins?” 

_Us, I, she._ The woman herself speaks like she doesn’t know if she _is_ Shiori or not. But her words sting more than he would like to admit. It’s true—whatever had been holding her back is gone, replaced by something cold and ruthless, a Sin Eater killer through and through. _Your Warrior of Darkness,_ he thinks to himself. _Your weapon of darkness. Is this not what you wanted?_

“I never wanted this,” he mutters, deflating. “I never wanted you to become—” 

“I have _always_ been this, Exarch,” she cuts him off. “I have always been here. I _am_ your precious Warrior—the parts of her she doesn’t want you to see. The anger, the grief, the ruthlessness, and, well,” she chuckles, “the _desire_ , too.” 

He blinks. “You—” 

He’s stunned into silence by her closing the distance between them with barely a couple steps, climbing into the sofa, into his _lap_ , and caging him in, hands on his shoulders. He stills, hands closing into fists at his sides. 

“Tell me,” she whispers, “do you care for her?” 

She lowers herself the slightest bit, hips now fully resting over his lips, her thighs on each side of him, knees digging into the sofa. He can feel her scent, this close, lavender and clean sweat. He grits his teeth. 

“More than anything,” he says. It’s the truth. She hums curiously, as if amused by his answer. 

Then she grabs his crystallized hand and places it flat over her chest. 

“Could you _love_ her, knowing what I am?” she asks. He doesn’t breathe. “Would you still care for her, if you knew the deepest, ugliest parts of her soul—those she hides with smiles and pleasantries? 

He can feel her heartbeat, the rise and fall of her chest as she breathes, the only thing separating his hand from her breast the thin, soft fabric of her camise. He swallows. She keeps talking. 

“That’s why she hides them, you know. For all of her displays of bravery, the girl is so scared of being _loved._ So scared said love might vanish once they see how much she’s been hurt. How angry she is, how mad—” 

There’s an unspeakable sadness to her voice now, but she stops mid sentence, lowering her gaze. He stills, a knot deep in his throat. _I would love you, no matter what. Let me. Come back to me._

She laughs. When she looks up again, her eyes are hollow. 

“But we needn’t delve into such matters here and now, do we?” she asks, grabs both of his hands and sets them neatly on her hips, over the curve of her—oh, _wicked white._ “Tell me, Exarch—do you _want_ her?” 

_Yes, gods, yes._ “Not like this,” he grits. 

She rolls her eyes. “I can’t do anything she doesn’t want to do, herself,” she mutters, “and she wants you, you know. Shall I tell you what she imagines, alone in her bed at night? How she pictures your hands on her body, your lips on hers, your voice in her ear saying things so _filthy_ I daresay _you_ would blush yourself, if you were to hear them?” 

His grip on her tightens so hard he’s sure it must be painful, but she only lets a pleased little sigh that makes heat pool low in his stomach. Then she starts _moving_ , a barely there rock of her hips, but he can feel it, every ilm— 

“I don’t—” he gasps, “I _can’t—”_

“Give in,” she whispers, low and heady. “You want this. She wants this.” 

Here she is, her but not _her_ , saying those things he had always wanted to hear, but— 

There’s a knock on the door. 

She’s out of his lap in seconds. 

“Mistress Minami,” comes the voice from behind the door she has just opened, “I’m terribly sorry to bother you, but your comrades have requested your presence. They say it’s a most urgent matter.” 

“Thank you,” she says. “I’ll be right there.” 

She closes the door quietly, then turns to him. He swallows thickly, for once thankful for the cowl that hides his features. 

“How unfortunate that we won’t be able to finish our little chat,” she says, walking back to where he’s sitting, bending at the waist so they’re at eye level. “But know that I’ll always be here, waiting, should you decide to give your hero what she wants.” 

_I’ll always be here_. It feels like a threat. A warning, maybe. _She’s not coming back. She doesn’t want to come back—_

“Have a good evening, my lord,” she says, and then she’s gone, leaving him with only his shame for company. 

He wonders, now, if it’s possible to miss a person you never truly knew. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	22. day #21 — foibles. wolexarch, 695 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #21 — foibles.** /fȯi-bəl, 'foibəl/: _noun,_ a minor flaw or shortcoming in character or behavior.
>
>> “Why are you here,” she mutters flatly. Cold. It reminds him of _her,_ but four—or two hundred and four, by his reckoning—years ago. A stonewall.
>> 
>> “It’s been three nights,” he says. “You need to sleep.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> somewhat of a companion piece to "lucubration", though it's not necessary to read it before this one. set in between 5.2 and 5.3. no content warnings.

She shoots another bolt of lightning from her bare hand and G’raha watches, silent. Her grimoire floats in the air and the very aether around them crackles; her eyes glow with fire and rage. Another strike, then another. The wooden dummy is charred and smoking. She doesn’t stop. 

“Shiori,” he says quietly, approaches her not unlike one would a spooked, small, _feral_ animal; one who might leap at your throat and tear it open should you so much as take one wrong step. 

She stills. Her hand stops halfway to another strike, sparks flying from the tips of her fingers. 

“Why are you here,” she mutters flatly. Cold. It reminds him of _her_ , but four—or two hundred and four, by his reckoning—years ago. A stonewall. 

“It’s been three nights,” he says. “You need to sleep.” 

She clicks her tongue. Another strike. 

“I’m fine.” 

The bags under her eyes say otherwise. Three nights she has retired to this place to practice her magic for hours on end, neglecting food and sleep and not answering any who ask what ails her so, avoiding him at every opportunity. Joining him in bed after he fell asleep, leaving him before he woke. Sometimes not coming to bed at all. 

G’raha steps forward. Then again, then again, until his chest is to her back. He places a hand on her shoulder, one arm around her waist. She stills again. 

“Raha,” she sighs. “Don’t.” 

“No.” 

“You’ll hurt yourself.” 

“I won’t,” he says, simply. “ _You_ won’t.” 

His hand slides down from her shoulder, over her forearm; he holds her hand in his and thumbs slow circles over the back of it. Her skin feels rough and chapped, the strain on her aether almost palpable. Something in him aches. 

“Talk to me,” he pleads, low and pained. 

Whatever she hears in his voice makes her wilt, if just slightly; the tension he feels under his touch ceding the tiniest bit. _She’s weak to you_ , Alisaie had told him, though it felt like it pained her to do so, before he left. _If anyone can reach her—_

Shiori sighs. “You’re not going to leave, are you.” 

“No.” 

She squirms, but he holds her tighter, chin over her shoulder. Several long moments pass before she places a hand over his and finds the energy to speak. 

“He has Ardbert,” she whispers, quiet and hurt and _scared._ “He’s _unsundered_ , and he has Ardbert.” 

_Ah._

“Against Emet-Selch, I… I only won because Ardbert helped me. I couldn’t have done it without him. But Ardbert can’t help me anymore and _Elidibus—_ he took his body and he’s _using_ him and I—” 

She takes a deep breath. “I have to be strong, if I’m going to defeat him. _Stronger._ Every second I spent resting is a second that could have been spent getting _better._ I don’t have time, Raha.” 

He traces patterns on her waist with his fingers, pondering. There it is, once again—the burden and the refusal to share it. It frustrates and saddens him in equal measure. 

“Time is indeed against us, and I understand why you may feel pressured, under those circumstances,” he says. “What I _don’t_ understand, however, is why you speak as if you must face him alone.” 

Shiori stiffens. He can almost feel the realization washing over her. “I—” 

“And surely _you_ must know that you’ll help no one by working yourself into an early grave, Warrior of Darkness.” 

She stills for a moment, then chuckles, body shedding its tension all at once. “Alright, Raha,” she says, “the irony of _you_ having to come convince me to rest isn’t lost on me, thank you.” 

“We do share far too many of the same foibles, as I’ve been told.” 

“Can we truly call them just _foibles_ when we are both so prone to working ourselves to exhaustion, I wonder.” 

“Maybe,” he says, pulling away from her, “or maybe not. But I shall be happy to discuss semantics after the lady has gotten some well needed rest _._ ” 

He doesn’t have to look at her face to know she’s rolling her eyes, but when he starts walking back to the Crystarium, her hand in his, she follows. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a shorter one today, and maybe a little lackluster, sorry. i might be doing shorter prompts from now on, as real life has been messing me up a bit, but i wanted to take time to thank you all for your support so far. it has been incredibly motivating <3
> 
> find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	23. day #22 — argy-bargy. wolexarch, 930 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #22 — argy-bargy.** /ärjēˈbärjē, ɑːr.dʒiˈbɑːr.dʒi/: _noun,_ loud argument or disagreement that is not usually serious; noisy quarreling or wrangling.
>
>> "Cussing, angry Shiori is usually eight drinks Shiori,” says Alphinaud, “but this… particular type is one I'm not yet familiar with, I'm afraid." 
>> 
>> "How do you know this," Alisaie asks. Alphinaud's expression immediately goes vacant, the look in his eyes not unlike what G'raha has seen in soldiers after actual wars. He doesn't answer. Alisaie doesn't ask again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> an immediate sequel to [matter of fact](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64063033), though reading it is not strictly necessary to understand this one. 
> 
> **content warnings:** alcohol consumption

The party has mostly dispersed by the time the children leave G’raha alone, now with some extra braids in his hair and a flower crown over his head that he feels is mildly embarrassing but can’t really bring himself to remove either way. He sits by one of the furthermost tables in the area that Shiori had retired to and now all the Scions are lounging about and nurses his stale, lukewarm glass of wine, feeling too tipsy to care. 

Shiori and Thancred are still dancing—or not so much dancing as they’re flailing about and laughing like children, which is pretty amusing to watch, if a little uncharacteristic. He buries the part of him that feels jealous, seals it in a box and ships the box off to the Empty, then lets himself just sit there and enjoy the atmosphere. Peace, at last—what an odd thought it is. For so long he had pictured this day, but never had he dared to imagine he would live to see it. Yet here he stands, alive and well, the Sin Eaters gone and the Eight Umbral Calamity prevented, dwelling in dangerous thoughts of maybe, maybe being free to do what he truly wants to do, from now on. 

So absorbed in such thoughts, he fails to notice an approaching, drunk menace, thoughts coming to a halt only when she’s already standing—or rather, wobbling—right in front of him. 

“Exarrrch,” she slurs. 

G’raha blinks. It takes that exact amount of time for her to throw herself into his lap, hands gripping the collar of his robes. Her cheeks are flushed and her breath smells like ale and by the gods she’s too _close_. G’raha’s hands automatically land on her hips to catch her, mind going blank. 

“M… My friend—” 

“G’raha Tia,” she says, “you,” jabs a finger on his chest, “are a fucking _idiot._ ” 

“Uh,” G’raha answers eloquently. Somewhere behind them, Thancred laughs. Alisaie eyes them with an expression that can only be described as disgust, and takes a very long chug of her ale. 

“I can’t _believe_ you were going to—get yourself _killed_ for my sake,” she mutters, “that you dared _hide_ yourself from me and pretend you didn’t _know_ what I was talking about when I asked about _you_ , right to your _face—”_

He swallows. “I truly am s—” 

“Shut _up,_ ” she growls, “I’m not done.” 

G’raha looks around for someone, _anyone_ who might help him in this time of need, but the Scions are either watching with barely concealed amusement (Y’shtola, Urianger), definitely not concealed amusement (Thancred), barely concealed _horror_ (Alisaie, Ryne), or quiet resignation (Alphinaud). G’raha accepts his fate. 

“You think you’re so _smart_ , with your schemes and your half-truths and—” she pulls at his hood, bringing his head dangerously close to her chest which, _okay_ , “your stupid cowl? If you had actually died I swear to all the gods I would have found a way to bring you back so I could kill you _myself—_ ” 

Shiori proceeds to yell at him for several minutes, and G’raha sits in silence as she tells him in about sixty-three different ways how much of an idiot he is. Briefly, a part of him wonders if he actually _enjoys_ being berated like this—which, granted, might be a bit of a dangerous thought to have when her hips are hovering so close to his loins. 

“And that one time back in Mor Dhona when you got that disgusting _slime_ all over my robes because you decided to go off by yourself and fight two morbols at once and I had to go _rescue_ you, you im—imbe—” 

“Imbecile,” G’raha suggests. 

“You _imbecile_ —” 

Ryne fidgets, looking equal parts amazed and terrified. “Um,” she says, “is she—usually like this? When she’s drunk?” 

"Cussing, angry Shiori is usually eight drinks Shiori,” says Alphinaud, “but this… particular type is one I'm not yet familiar with, I'm afraid." 

"How do you know this," Alisaie asks. Alphinaud's expression immediately goes vacant, the look in his eyes not unlike what G'raha has seen in soldiers after actual wars. He doesn't answer. Alisaie doesn't ask again. 

“I do believe someone ought to give our friend some respite,” Y’shtola says, though she makes no move to do so herself. “I’d say he has suffered quite enough.” 

Shiori turns. “And _you_ ,” she snarls, pointing at Urianger, “if you lie to me again, I swear I’ll make your _arse_ as flat as those cards of yours, Thancred’s laments be damned—” 

“Alright,” says Thancred, suddenly very intent on getting Shiori to stop talking, “I think that’s quite enough, my friend.” 

“No,” Shiori says, _still_ comfortably sat on G’raha’s lap, “I have _words_ for all of you—except you, Ryne, you’re an angel and I love you—” 

“I… have to agree, my friend,” Alphinaud interjects, “that’s enough argy-bargy for one day, I’d say.” 

“What the _fuck_ is argy-bargy, Alphinaud,” Shiori deadpans. Alisaie _cackles_. 

She does, eventually, get off his lap, after a couple minutes of insistence from the twins and some stumbling. He sighs and drinks what remains of his wine in a single gulp when she does. 

“Feeling alright?” Thancred asks, moving to sit next to G’raha and offering his own half-full bottle of wine to him. 

“I’ve been better,” G’raha answers, pouring himself a new glass. 

Thancred laughs. “Don’t you worry, my friend,” he says. “There’s plenty more of that, ah, _fire_ in her. I’m sure you’ll be able to coax it out eventually.” 

Thancred leaves then, still laughing, leaving G’raha to choke on his wine and wonder why the gods have chosen to torment him so. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! i love writing drunk shiori because she's a menace to society, but specially to g'raha. 
> 
> you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	24. day #23 — shuffle. wolexarch, 2k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #23 — shuffle.** /SHəfəl, ˈʃʌf.əl/: _verb,_ to rearrange a deck of cards by sliding the cards over each other quickly; _noun,_ an act of shuffling a deck of cards.
>
>> “Indulge me,” she insists, seemingly amused by his hesitation. “It’s just harmless fun, my lord—something I’m sure both you and I could use more of.”
>> 
>> He swallows. There’s a deep, if irrational fear within him that she’ll somehow be able to pull a card that reads “G’raha Tia” in big, bold letters.  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you will suspend your disbelief and join me in pretending the 78-card tarot deck exists within the xiv universe

This time he finds Shiori by one of the tables in the Catenaries, and it’s barely half a bell past five. She doesn’t seem to notice him approaching, occupied with a deck of cards she shuffles with slow but practiced deftness. 

“Is this a late night or an early morning, my friend?” 

She blinks and looks up at him, hands stopping their movement. Her lips press together in a closed-mouth smile. 

“I believe I should be the one to ask that question, my lord,” she answers, bemused. “Lyna has mentioned to me in passing some concerns about your sleep schedule—or rather, your apparent lack of one.” 

She gestures towards the chair across from hers, a silent invitation. “In my defense,” he says, sitting, “sleep hasn’t been a need of mine for a long time, now.” 

“Not being _necessary_ doesn’t mean it wouldn’t do you well,” she says. “But I’m certain you’ve heard enough nagging from the Captain as is. I doubt mine will convince you to get any more sleep.” 

He shrugs, smiling wryly, then gestures to the deck in her hands. “And what might those be?” 

He’s aware she’s proficient in Sharlayan astromancy, but whatever deck she’s holding doesn’t seem familiar to him—far too many cards, for instance. 

“Tarot cards,” she answers. “My grandmother taught me to read them when I was a girl, and it’s been a pastime of mine ever since. Have you ever had your fortune read, Exarch?” 

That’s a new one, he supposes. The sheer extent of her... abilities, be it in combat or otherwise, never ceases to amaze him. “I’m afraid not,” he answers. 

Shiori hums. “Care to try, then? I for one am _quite_ interested in learning what may lie in the future of a man such as yourself.” 

Her tone is pleasant, but the glint in her eyes feels vulturous. He resists the urge to squirm under her gaze. “I’m not sure I should—” 

“Indulge me,” she insists, seemingly amused by his hesitation. “It’s just harmless fun, my lord—something I’m sure both you and I could use more of.” 

He swallows. There’s a deep, if irrational fear within him that she’ll somehow be able to pull a card that reads “G’raha Tia” in big, bold letters. Yet he can’t bring himself to refuse her. Harmless fun, she says—he certainly hopes it’ll hold true. 

“... Very well,” he concedes. 

Shiori beams. “Thank you,” she says, shuffling the cards one more time. She splits the deck in three parts, rearranges them back together, then spreads them out in front of him in a tidy arc. “Pick six. Try not to worry over it too much—just follow your intuition.” 

G’raha proceeds to worry too much over it. Somehow this feels like a matter of life and death. Trying not to second-guess himself, he touches the back of six cards with a finger and slides them down away from the arc and towards the center of the table. 

Shiori gathers the remaining cards in a single pile and slides them to the side, then flips each of the cards he’d chosen, placing them around the table in a circular formation. She hums again, resting her head on her hand and looking down at the cards with a smile, as if they’re telling her a particularly amusing story. 

“These cards,” she says, gesturing to the three cards that have names written on them, “are the major arcana. They represent the most deeply rooted issues within our lives. And these cards,” she points towards the other three, which only have numbers on them, “are the minor arcana. They provide context to the major arcana, and relate to our everyday experiences.” 

G’raha looks down to examine the cards. He has no idea what they mean, and he hasn’t even _seen_ many tarot cards to be able to judge, but he’d be willing to bet that Shiori owns the most beautiful deck they offer. The artwork on the cards is stunning, enough that he wishes he could get them framed—each picture seemingly hand drawn in black and white, aside from a unique splash of color somewhere on the card. 

“Each position in the spread has a specific meaning, which is why the order you pulled the cards is important,” Shiori explains. “This one,” she points at the card at the very top of the spread, “is your question. What you’re really concerned about, at the moment.” 

The card in question is void of any color, depicting only seven circles with stars inside of them, sorted in a diagonal line. Nothing about it seems to give away its meaning. 

“For you, it’s the seven of pentacles. It relates to contemplation and uncertainty, especially in regard to one’s work—such as wondering if you’re going to succeed. Perhaps you’re looking back at your hard work and wondering if your efforts might fail, or go unrewarded.” She taps her finger against the card, staring G’raha down with a smile that feels threateningly _knowingly_. “Sounds familiar to you?” 

_That does sound like my biggest concern, my friend, thank you._ “Perhaps a bit,” he says, straining his lips in what he hopes comes across as a calm smile. If Shiori smells his fear, which he somehow wouldn’t put past her to be _able_ to, she doesn’t mention it. Instead, she taps another card. 

“Your second card is what you want most right now. For you, it’s the Lovers.” 

The name is written on the card, below a pair of birds mid-flight. They’re surrounded by lines of color, as if rays of light are pouring down on them. G’raha suddenly feels very exposed. 

“If you cards are insinuating I’m looking for a lover, my friend, I’m afraid they’ve erred this time,” he says mildly, praying Althyk won’t let her tell it’s a blatant lie. 

Shiori laughs. “It doesn’t _have_ to be a relationship, necessarily. The Lovers can also mean union and harmony, so perhaps you’re craving a sense of balance in your life, or merely... companionship.” 

The accuracy of this is starting to make him feel more than a little uncomfortable. Shiori continues. 

“ _Or_ , it can be exactly what you thought. The most obvious meaning behind the Lovers card is, indeed, love. Though it _could_ also relate to, say, sexual desire,” she suggests, cocking her head innocently as if she has not just implied he’s overwhelmed with _lust_. G’raha’s breath catches in his throat, sending him into a quite graceless cough. Shiori chuckles again, but spares him further torment by moving on to the next card. 

“Your third card represents your fears. For this one, you drew the Tower.” 

Despite its name, the card she points to doesn’t depict an actual tower. Instead, there’s a tree being struck by lightning, shattering its trunk and setting its leaves on fire. Wonderful. 

“The Tower relates to sudden change, chaos and, well,” she pauses, holding what would be eye contact were it not for his cowl. “Revelations. See the lightning? It cuts through the illusions and lies you have been telling yourself and others, making the truth come to light. As a result, all that you had built upon these lies crumbles down around you.” 

_You’re a liar, and your biggest fear is that your deception will be laid bare,_ she might as well have told him. G’raha instinctually averts her eyes, even though she couldn’t see his if she tried. “I see,” is all he says. 

Shiori seems to take his lack of elaboration as a sign to continue. “Your fourth and fifth are, respectively, what you have working in your favor and against you. You drew the two of cups and the seven of swords.” 

Shiori turns her attention towards the fourth card. It depicts, like its name, a pair of cups. Between them stands two roses, crossing each other in an X shape, with the red of their petals acting as the only colour in the card. 

“This is another card that relates to love and connections,” she explains, seeming amused. “Based on its position, I’d say there’s an important relationship in your life, and the bond you share with this person will be key in facing the obstacles that may stand in your way.” 

The way Shiori watches him feels different from mere moments ago, like there’s more she wants to say but is holding herself back from doing so. The weight of her gaze makes his pulse quicken. 

“It _could_ be just a friendship, though this card usually relates to romance. Your connection with this person is—or will be—very deep, and you’ll rely on each other a lot.” 

She flashes him another smile, but something about it feels wistful. She seems—sad. Before he can question why, she continues. 

“Your fifth—what’s working against you—is the seven of swords,” she says, turning her attention towards said card. Akin to its name, there are six swords displayed in a vertical line. Underneath them lies a curled-up fox, hiding the seventh sword beneath its tail. 

“Somehow I feel I could guess the meaning of this one,” he says, wryly. Shiori snickers. 

“It does feel a bit on the nose,” she concedes. “As you may have guessed, the seven of swords relates to deception and trickery. Whether you're the keeper of the secrets or the kept-from is for you to tell—but, either way, this deception is not working in your favor. It is likely interfering with your goals, or even the relationship that the two of cups represents.” 

G’raha’s throat feels dry. He resigns himself to his suffering. “I’ll be sure to keep that in mind,” he says flatly, Shiori’s eyes glued to him making it exceedingly difficult to piece his words together. She continues. 

“The last card in the spread is the outcome of your current situation. And you actually drew the _first_ card in the major arcana for it, which is interesting. It’s a bit of an odd card to have as a conclusion.” 

He turns his attention towards the sixth card, at the lowest position in the spread. It depicts a bird perched on a branch. Though the animal is drawn in black and white, the background is made of horizontal lines in yellow and orange, reminding him of the sky at dawn. “The Fool”, reads the letters at the bottom of the card. Not satisfied with calling him a lecherous liar who desperately craves companionship, the cards have now resorted to calling him an imbecile. Wonderful. 

“I feel like your cards have been making quite the concentrated effort to insult me, my friend.” 

Shiori giggles. He’s thankful she finds his suffering amusing, at least. “That does seem so, Exarch,” she says, leaning her head against her hand, elbow perched on the table. “But I must remind you that they were pulled by _your_ hand. By themselves, they’re quite harmless. In the order _you_ placed them, however…” 

The implication doesn’t amuse him. He clears his throat. “Will you tell me what the last one means?” he asks, eager to change the subject. 

Shiori blinks, then turns her attention back to the cards. “Despite its name, the Fool doesn’t represent literal foolishness,” she explains, finger tracing the edges of the card absentmindedly. “It relates to new beginnings, new adventures and opportunities. Freedom, following one’s heart, the excitement of embracing the unknown—those are all things represented by the Fool. It’s the start of a new journey, which is why it’s the very first card in the major arcana.” 

If the previous cards felt like insults in their accuracy, this one feels like mockery. 

“I guess this means that in the end, you’ll find yourself able to begin anew, Exarch,” she says, offering him a small, tired smile. “A nice thought, I suppose. Is there aught you long to do, once your work is done?” 

G’raha Tia would have enough answers to this question to entertain her through the whole day. The Exarch, however— 

“Rest,” he answers. A half-truth, as he’s so used to delivering. “Some rest would be nice.” 

Shiori hums in quiet agreement. The cards lay between them, an ocean of distance. 

“That would be nice,” she says. “That would be nice indeed.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading my 2k tarot word vomit! i may or may not be very passionate about it. the deck i described in this piece does exist, by the way, and is a personal favourite of mine—it's called the wild unknown, by kim krans.
> 
> you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	25. day #24 — beam. wolgraha, 1k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #24 — beam.** /bēm, biːm/: _verb,_ to smile radiantly; express an emotion with a radiant smile.
>
>> “Would you take me with you?” he asks before he can lose the courage to, cautiously hopeful. “In your next adventure.”
>> 
>> “Yes,” she says immediately, not a shred hesitation in her voice. “I would.”  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CT era things that i will probably still rewrite ten times. cw for brief mentions of alcohol consumption.

G’raha doesn’t remember the moment it _happened_ , but the moment he realizes it starts like this: they meet in his tent one evening, another that would be likely spent with very little sleep and too much dust from old tomes and scrolls on Allagan history, except this time G’raha has a bottle of wine. Of _good_ wine, mind you, not the stuff Rammbroes had stacked away somewhere he _thought_ no one knew about—a bottle he’d managed to buy from a traveling merchant on a trip to Revenant’s Toll. 

And Shiori may be stern and no-nonsense but even she isn’t immune to burnout, so when he proposes they share some tales over glasses of wine rather than spending another sleepless night reading about people long dead and finding no helpful information at all, she gives in. 

And G’raha—he gets a little carried away telling her about his _exploits_ during his time in Sharlayan. 

“Oh _gods_ ,” Shiori says, or tries to, through a fit of giggles. “You did _what?”_

“I was trying to leave a _lasting impression_ ,” G’raha absolutely does not whine. “Also, I was seventeen.” 

That does little to stop Shiori’s laughter—in fact, it only seems to make it _harder_ , and she actually tumbles backwards and lies on her back, clutching her stomach and laughing as hard and as genuinely as G’raha has seen her do since they’d met all those months ago. 

And G’raha—he’ s a little dumbstruck. Maybe it’s because he’s tipsy, or maybe it’s because for all of Shiori’s smiles, her laughter was still a rare sound to hear. But he stares down at her and she’s laying down among the scattered papers on the floor of his tent, all disheveled hair and flushed cheeks and laughing so gracelessly she actually chokes on air and makes a weird, kind of gross half-snorting sound and the first thought that crosses his mind is that she’s beautiful. 

The second is that he’s completely, utterly screwed. 

He only realizes he’s probably been staring for far too long when she speaks again. “G’raha?” 

He swallows. “Huh?” 

“Everything all right?” she asks, turning to lie on her side and sounding genuinely concerned despite the fact she’s still beaming. “You were staring.” 

He can’t tell if it’s the alcohol or the dire feeling in his chest that they won’t be able to share a moment like this again that makes him unusually honest. 

“That was the first time I’ve seen you laugh like that,” he confesses. “You’re always smiling, but—you never laugh. Not this genuinely.” 

“Ah,” she says, averting his eyes. “That’s—” 

“I don’t mean to sound accusatory,” he says hurriedly. “I’m just happy—to see you like this. Even if it _is_ at the cost of my personal dignity.” 

That makes her laugh again, and he sighs with relief, moving to lay down beside her. She looks like she’s pondering something for a long while, and when she speaks again, it’s in a quiet, hesitant voice. 

“I haven’t… had much reason to laugh, recently. Or my whole life, for that matter.” She smiles, but it’s strained. “That’s not to say I was always _unhappy—_ it’s just… When your home is under Garlean rule, there’s always fear. Every moment of your life. So you learn to keep your emotions in check, to expect the worse even in the moments you _are_ happy. Unlearning that—it takes a while.” 

Oh. She had never— “Your home…?” 

“In Othard,” she explains. “Quite far from here. Not that there’s much left of it. Again—Garlemald.” 

“And your family?” he asks before he can think. 

“Dead. Save for my brother, though he was far from unscathed.” 

She doesn’t look at him as she speaks, but the tinge of emotion in her voice speaks volumes. She had never told him—she had never told anyone here, as far as he knew. But here she was, confiding in him, baring her heart for him, of all people— 

“I’m sorry,” he says, reaching for her hand and cringing at himself for not having better words to offer. 

Something inside of him swells when she squeezes his hand back. “There’s no need for you to apologize. It is what it is, and it certainly is not your fault.” 

They lay silent for a few moments, G’raha thumbing lazily at the back of her hand, marveling at the softness of it, how small it feels in his. The Warrior of Light, Eikon slayer, savior of Eorzea—a girl barely over twenty, with small hands and a kind smile and a too tender heart she built walls around out of fear. 

The hero, he had admired. Revered, even. But the girl... 

“Tell me more about your adventures,” he pleads, breaking the silence. 

She smiles, amused. “You never tire of those, do you?” 

“No,” he replies honestly. “But tonight I would have you indulge me with something less majestic—’tis only fair recompense for the _humbling_ tales I have offered you myself.” 

She laughs—how blessed he is, to hear that sound so many times tonight—but relents. He listens attentively as she begins to talk, watches every shift in her expression as if he’s trying to burn the image behind his eyelids. _Don’t forget this,_ a voice inside of him screams. _Don’t you dare forget this._

By the time she’s done, however, he can barely contain his own laughter. 

“I’m sorry, you— _sniffed a Chocobo?”_

“That I did,” she says, still giggling herself. “Not only of besting Primals in fearless combat is a Warrior of Light made, G’raha Tia.” 

They laugh and laugh until, eventually, they fall into a comfortable silence. This moment, right now—this light dizziness that only comes with being slightly tipsy, the feeling of her hand in his, so soft and warm—he wants to commit it to memory. Every image, every sensation. 

“Would you take me with you?” he asks before he can lose the courage to, cautiously hopeful. “In your next adventure.” 

“Yes,” she says immediately, not a shred of hesitation in her voice. “I would.” 

_Say it,_ a part of him screams again. _Tell her._

“I’ll hold you to that, then,” he says instead. She beams at him, and he lets himself watch her until his eyelids feel too heavy for comfort. 

_Tomorrow,_ he thinks to himself, and lets slumber take him. _Tomorrow, after they come back from the World of Darkness, he would tell her everything._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! sorry this is a little rough, i did write it between 3 and 6 am (':  
> i also belatedly realize this is not canon compliant because the sniffing chocobo quest was removed in the ARR revamp. end of an era
> 
> come mourn the loss of the best ARR quest with me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	26. day #25 — wish. wolgraha, 841 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #25 — wish.** /wɪʃ, wiSH/: _verb,_ to have a desire for something, such as something unattainable; to desire a person or thing.
>
>> Shiori is twelve when her mother teaches her how to fold paper cranes.

Shiori is twelve when her mother teaches her how to fold paper cranes. 

She’s inherited a lot of things from her mother—the hair, the eyes, the infuriating stubbornness, as grandmother likes to call it—but her skill for handicraft wasn’t one of them, and after about a dozen failures, Shiori’s more than ready to move on to something else. 

But her mother just laughs, runs a gentle hand through her hair and tells her about this legend her own father had told her when she was a girl; about how if you fold a thousand paper cranes, the gods will grant you one wish. Shiori listens, sits back down, and only gets up again when she manages to fold her first one. 

She makes it to nine hundred and sixty-seven the day before their house burns down. 

  


*

  


By the time Shiori’s twenty, she’s long past believing paper cranes grant wishes. Or in gods, as a general concept. But she’s come to find paperfolding soothing, and the mindless, mechanical nature of it helps her relax when nothing else does. 

The fact it makes her feel just a little bit close to her mother again helps. 

So she keeps doing it, whenever she has free time and spare sheets of paper, which, granted, doesn’t end up being very often once she starts doing the adventuring thing. But then comes NOAH, her time with them giving her quite a bit of both, and she quickly falls back into the old habit. 

G’raha Tia is the first to notice. 

She expects him to be dismissive about it, maybe tease her a bit if he was particularly intent on being a pest that day. But instead he sits beside her in silence, and watches. 

A quarter bell passes before he speaks, and asks her to teach him. She does. 

He’s an odd boy. For all of his brashness and bravado and the way he never seems to stop talking when he’s near her, he for once seems perfectly content to just sit nearby and fold cranes with her in silence. 

He’s really good with his hands, she notices. Something about the thought makes her feel a little flustered. 

Eventually, they start talking. She tells him about her mom and about the thousand cranes and for once, he doesn’t joke, doesn’t tease. He just listens, and sometimes he tells her things about his childhood, about Sharlayan. 

It’s nice. Soon enough, she finds herself looking forward to their little sessions. Looking forward to being with him. 

They make three hundred and thirty-four cranes before the doors close between them. 

  


*

  


Shiori wants to punch that Exarch fellow in the face for a lot of reasons, but at least the room he gives her isn’t one. 

It’s a nice room. Really nice, actually, and definitely nicer than her own home used to be back when she and her brother first moved to Eorzea. She’s a little surprised to find how much it caters to her preferences, honestly—the flowers in the window, the fruits in the table, they’re all her favourites. But the biggest surprise ends up being opening the drawer under her desk to find a full stack of thin, colourful paper. Ideal for folding. 

It’s convenient. Too convenient, in fact, and she means to question the man about it, but then she receives a ghostly visitor and learns the twins’ whereabouts and that issue is out of her mind as quickly as it had arrived. 

Still, as soon as the next opportunity presents itself, she makes a trip to the Musica Universalis and returns with only a tall, clear glass jar. Nearly every night she spends in the First, she folds cranes to soothe herself to sleep. 

Ardbert, much like G’raha back then, likes to watch. They just talk, however, since not being able to touch the paper makes Ardbert not much of a potential student. It’s nice, nonetheless. 

She understands the flowers, the fruits and the paper when she returns from Mt. Gulg, feeling like the biggest fool across all the damned fourteen shards. 

She fills the jar with two hundred and thirty-six cranes before the man she loves turns to crystal. 

  


*

  


“Did you ever make it?” 

Shiori stops halfway through a fold, G’raha’s voice startling her. “Huh?” 

“A thousand, I mean,” he explains, turning to lay sideways in bed so he can look at her. “Of the cranes.” 

She ponders for a moment. “I suppose if you count since I started, I’ve crossed the one thousand mark a long time ago,” she says. 

“Hmm,” he hums, “and did you get your wish?” 

She looks at him, lying in her bed. He’d fallen asleep with his hairpins on, and now they’re tangled in his locks in a mess that’s surely going to be a pain to untangle. His entire face is blotchy and puffy, cheek squished against the pillow, eyes threatening to flutter closed. Something in her chest swells and swells until she feels like it won’t fit inside of her anymore. 

“Yeah,” she answers, “I think I did.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i've had origami estabilished as one of shiori's hobbies in my mind for a long time, but i never actually wrote about it, so this was a nice opportunity. as always, thank you for reading!
> 
> you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	27. day #26 — when pigs fly. wolgraha, 1k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #26 — when pigs fly.** /(h)wən pɪgs flī/: _idiom,_ used to say that one thinks that something will never happen.
>
>> On the list of things Shiori says without knowing she’ll regret it in matter of minutes, there’s one in particular that is most catastrophic:
>> 
>> “You can _sing?”_

On the list of things Shiori says without knowing she’ll regret it in matter of minutes, there’s one in particular that is most catastrophic: 

“You can _sing?”_

G’raha fidgets in that particular way he always does when he’s flustered, rubbing his forearm and averting her eyes. “I—A little, yes,” he confesses. “Though I only really know the songs my father taught me—” 

“Sing for me!” she blurts out with the excitement of a child in Starlight morning, half fascinated and half disbelieving. G’raha Tia, a _singer._ “Please,” she adds, belatedly realizing she’s kind of leaning into his personal space. 

G’raha goes a little pink in the cheeks at that, which honestly just makes her want to push his buttons even more. “I don’t know,” he mumbles. 

“Please, G’raha?” she pleads. “I really want to hear it.” 

Pink becomes fuschia. Shiori is _so_ alive. 

But G’raha stays silent, and she doesn’t _actually_ want to make the boy uncomfortable, as amusing as it is to be the one doing the teasing for once. She speaks again. “If you really don’t want to, it’s f—” 

“No, I—” he mutters, “it’s fine. Just don’t _stare_ , all right?” 

Shiori nods emphatically, settling back down and waiting. G’raha takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, and begins to sing. 

It’s a beautiful song, the one he chooses. 

His voice under the dim light of the sunset over Mor Dhona is impossibly lovely. It starts quiet and shaky, but in a minute it grows soft and tentative, each note like a drop of light. They rise and fall and hang in the air around them, the cool wind feeling even chillier against their warmth. His only accompaniment is the rustling of the leaves and the sway of the flowing waters of Lake Silvertear—there’s Shiori’s heartbeat too, but its rhythm is going a little too fast for such a slow, lovely song. 

She wants to look away but finds herself unable to. G’raha sings and she forces herself to watch and watch until the last note fades away and G’raha opens his eyes, cyan and crimson meeting silver. 

“There you have it,” he says, voice quiet and unusually shy. 

Shiori swallows. “That was a lovely song,” she says, glad her voice doesn’t reflect the rapid, staccato rhythm of her heartbeat. “You—have a nice voice.” 

“Thanks,” he mutters, lips curling around a smile. He blinks, and something that feels like _danger_ flashes through his eyes for a moment. “Now that you mention it,” he says, smile slowly turning into a smirk she’s very familiar with, “you mentioned before that you used to sing with your mother, didn’t you?” 

Oh, _hells_. 

“Sometimes, yes—” 

“So you can sing, then?” he leans in, close, far too close— “Will _you_ sing for me?” 

Any resemblance of composure that still remained in her slips through her fingers. “When pigs fly, maybe,” she blurts. “I’m not—I’m not like _you._ My mother was the good singer, I could barely pass as an amateur.” 

“Not fair,” G’raha pouts. “ _I_ sang for you.” 

“Well I told you you didn’t _have_ to!” 

G’raha whines some more, but she doesn’t give in. He eventually lets it go, and they walk back to camp in silence, Shiori escaping into her tent and crawling into her makeshift bed at the first opportunity she gets. She thinks of G’raha, of his voice under the sunset and his song upon the wind, and she does not sleep. 

  


*

  


“You know,” Raha ponders, head on her lap, the streak of crystal on his cheek glowing under the moonlight, “there’s one thing that you said to me, back in the time when we first met.” 

“I said a lot of things to you back then,” Shiori says, running her fingers through his hair lazily. “Granted, most of them were a variation of ‘you’re an insufferable pest, G’raha Tia’, but still.” 

He laughs. Gods, how she has missed that sound. “True, but what I’m thinking about wasn’t one of those. ‘Twas something you said on the day I sang for you.” 

Oh. Oh, no. 

“Raha—” 

“I asked,” he cuts her off, “if you’d sing for me. And you said you would— _when pigs fly._ ” His smile is familiar. Twenty-four years old, brash and mischievous, teasing her at every opportunity— “Tell me, love. What did you see when you visited Il Mheg?” 

Shiori closes her eyes. May her death be swift. “Flying pigs,” she answers, resigned. 

“Hmm,” he hums, impossibly self-satisfied. She heroically resists the urge to deck him. “Well?” 

She sighs. “Fine. But most of the songs I know are in Hingan.” 

“Anything is fine as long as I get to hear your voice.” 

“Mushy.” 

“So you say. You’re _blushing_ , Warrior of Darkness.” 

“Be quiet, will you,” she says without any bite, lets her eyes fall closed while he chuckles at her little outburst. She breathes, buries the embarrassment somewhere she can’t think about it, and starts singing. 

It’s not a particularly romantic song, but it is one that her mother used to sing for her, and the fond memories she has of it overwhelm the shyness she feels over singing to someone—even if that someone happens to be Raha. She doesn’t go through the whole song, instead letting her voice fade after the first couple minutes of it. 

“There,” she says, quietly, “I told you it wasn’t—” 

She’s cut off by a familiar pair of lips over hers, swallowing her words and the small, surprised gasp that escapes from her throat. He pulls her down with a hand on the nape of her neck and leans up to meet her halfway, kisses her until she’s breathless. 

“Okay,” she gasps, weakly, when they part. 

Raha laughs. “My apologies,” he says, settling back down on her lap. “I just can’t believe I lived—survived—a hundred years without hearing _that_.” 

Shiori fidgets. “It’s nothing special, Raha.” 

“Your uncanny ability to sell yourself short is as impressive as it is infuriating,” he sighs, but smiles soon after. “Will you sing again? Please.” 

She reaches down to touch his hair, twirling a lock around her finger. Soft. “You’re spoiled, you know,” she chides, but closes her eyes and lets herself sing one more time. 

Later, she watches him lying in bed beside her. She thinks about G’raha, twenty-four, his voice under the sunset and his song upon the wind. This time, she sleeps easily. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> pigs. 
> 
> find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	28. day #27 — call. wolexarch, 2k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #27 — call.** /kôl, kɔːl/: _verb,_ to speak in a loud voice so as to be heard at a distance; to make a request or demand; to get or try to get into communication by telephone.
>
>> G’raha curses quietly, the sound barely reaching her ears. “What do you want, Shiori?”
>> 
>> His voice has taken that breathy, rough quality it always does when he starts getting worked up. It makes her heartbeat pick up insistently. “Tell me what you would do,” she says. “If you were here with me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello my poor victims. long time no porn
> 
> "linkpearl sex" is a Thing that's been tossed around in the bookclub discord a few times now and lives in my mind rent free, so when i woke up today and opened the random word generator only to get "call" as my word i just decided to take it as a sign from the gods. a special shoutout to thefateofivalice who [wrote a wonderful linkpearl sex piece for day 25](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26269078/chapters/65039716) which really fed my horny brainworms. 
> 
> so yeah. linkpearl sex. enjoy. naturally, content warning for explicit sexual content.

When Shiori returns to the First after two weeks of tending to business back in the Source, it’s with the hope of dragging G’raha into her private quarters and not letting him leave for at least a day. But then there’s Alphinaud, and there are things that require her presence in Eulmore, and she finds herself making her way to Kholusia before they have a chance to exchange more than a few words. 

_It’s fine_ , she tells herself as she crawls into bed, feeling absolutely not fine. At least she was given a private room for the occasion. She sits against the headboard and picks up the linkpearl G’raha had given her a few weeks ago, taps a couple times against it. It barely rings twice before he picks up. 

“Dearest,” comes his voice, worried, through the device in her ear. She realizes belatedly that this is the first time she’s used it. “Is aught amiss?” 

“No,” she answers. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to cause you concern. Everything went fine, though there’s still more to be done in the morrow. I just missed you.” 

There’s the briefest sigh of relief from him, then she hears the smile on his voice when he speaks again. “And I you,” he says. 

His voice, though distorted the slightest bit through the linkpearl, is a most welcome relief after such a busy day. Gods, she’s missed him. Far too much. 

“How are things over there?” she asks. 

He starts talking but her thoughts drift elsewhere, the honeyed tone of his voice sending warm tingles down her spine. And between her legs, she realizes with a tinge of desperation. So long she had gone without bedding anyone, yet now the mere a fortnight in his absence were enough to make the sound of his voice cause heat to pool low and incessantly in her stomach. Gods damn him, he has made a hormonal teenager out of her. 

She misses him, desperately, in a very specific way. One hand slides down between her thighs, pelvis pressing against it. Gods, is she really— 

“Shiori?”  


She jumps at the sound of her name. “Yes?” 

“Is everything all right?” he asks. “If you need to rest, then—” 

“No,” Shiori answers hurriedly. “Will you—keep talking?” 

“Talking,” he repeats, confused. He’s silent for a moment until he seems to notice her breathing going slightly erratic. “Shiori, are you sure you’re alright?” 

“I am,” she breathes, cheeks flushing, “I’m just—thinking. About you.” 

That seems to give him pause. There’s some shuffling on the other side of the line, and she hears the click of a door closing before he speaks again. “And what exactly were you thinking about?” 

“Your hands.” she confesses. “Your mouth. On me.” 

G’raha curses quietly, the sound barely reaching her ears. “What do you want, Shiori?” 

His voice has taken that breathy, rough quality it always does when he starts getting worked up. It makes her heartbeat pick up insistently. “Tell me what you would do,” she says. “If you were here with me.” 

He chuckles, low and dark and heady. Her thighs clench. “Depends,” he purrs. “Are you in bed?” 

She nods, then remembers he can’t actually see her. “Yeah.” 

He hums, as if savoring the image in his mind. “Lie down for me,” he says. 

The speed at which she obeys would feel embarrassing if she wasn’t so aroused by the mere sound of his voice. Damn him. 

“Okay,” she whispers after she settles down. 

“You’re not touching yourself, are you?” 

“No,” she answers, heart beating in anticipation. “Should I be?” 

“No,” he says. “Not until I say you can.” 

Oh, _hells._

“ _Gods_ , Raha.” 

He chuckles again. If he keeps this up she’s afraid she’ll end up conditioning herself to get wet at the sound. 

“You should have known what asking me that would entail,” he says. “I’ve had the unfortunate luxury of being afforded a hundred years to think about all the things I want to do to you—and far too little, in comparison, to put them into practice. But I suppose, for a start, that if I were there, I would simply… look.” 

“Look,” she repeats. “At what?” 

“You, of course. Have you any idea how _enchanting_ you are? I thought I had seen everything, but—” he takes a deep breath as if steadying himself, “the way you look underneath me. Nothing compares. Nothing could ever compare.” 

He whispers the words as if in prayer, like the mere memory of seeing her underneath him is enough to make him fall to his knees in worship. It makes heat bloom in her cheeks, crawling its way down her body and setting her skin aflame in its wake. 

“So yes, if I were there, I would be looking at you,” he continues. “How could I ever look anywhere _else?”_

_Heavens take her._ “Then—” she gasps. “Then what.” 

He hums. “I’d get on top of you. Take your wrists in my hands and hold them down. You like it when I do that, don’t you?” 

The teasing tone in his voice makes it clear he knows the answer before she speaks. “You know I do.” 

“I would hold you down,” he continues. “Make sure you can’t touch yourself. You’re always so impatient—I know you’d start squirming. But I wouldn’t let go. Do you know why?” 

_Yes, you wicked man._ “Why?” 

“Because I want you ruined. I want to _wreck_ you, Eikon slayer. I want to hear you beg.” 

Shiori tries very hard not to think about why the use of one of her titles makes her _squirm._ “Raha—” 

“Next,” he breathes, “I would hike your shirt up. Run my hands up your waist to cup your breasts, touch them, kiss them—I’ve wondered if I can make you come just from that.” 

She sighs, the image making her feel a little dizzy. “You should try,” she says. “I want you to.” 

“Next time, then,” he says. “For now, I want _you_ to touch them. Slowly. I want you to do it like I would do—imagine I’m there with you.” 

_Finally._ She hikes up her sweater immediately, leaves it bundled up above her chest, and slowly, gently, touches herself. She closes her eyes and tries to picture G’raha’s hands, the rough pads of his fingers, the softness of his lips. He always goes so slow, takes his time making her fall apart— 

“Tell me how it feels.” 

“It’s—good,” she whispers. “But it’s not you. I want you here, Raha. Want you to touch me.” 

“So do I,” he groans. “Want you, always want you—” 

“If you were here,” she mutters, voice breaking into a high pitched moan when her own touch sends a delicious shiver up her spine, “I would get on my knees for you.” 

She hears his breath catch in his throat. “Shiori—” 

“I want you in my mouth, Raha. Your hands on my hair. Wanna choke on—” 

There’s a low growl on the other side of the line that is absolutely _delicious_. 

“Wicked white,” he rasps, “you will be the death of me.” 

Her turn to chuckle. “Ruin me first, then.” 

“I intend to,” he groans. “Suck on your fingers for me. Just enough to get them wet.” 

She does, makes plenty of sound while she’s at it so there’s no mistake what she’s mimicking, relishing the way he moans quietly as he hears it. 

“Touch yourself,” he commands, and she shivers. “Over your smalls. I want you to pretend your fingers are my mouth.” 

Fuck. _Fuck._ She grinds against her fingers, hips thrusting up into nothing. She can picture it, G’raha kissing her through the fabric, holding her hips down with one arm and just—taking her apart. He’s a man who’s learned patience in a way only someone who’s _waited_ so long can, and it shows in the way he fucks, to both her agony and delight. 

“If you were here, I would have you sit on my face,” he says quietly. “I’d make you come in my mouth until you can’t hold yourself up anymore.” 

He’s done it before, him and his wicked tongue, his sinful lips. Strong hands holding her hips down, forcing her to grind against his face until all she can do is quiver and shake— 

“Raha,” she moans helplessly, “Raha, let me touch myself, please.” 

“You’re being so good,” he breathes, and she hears the faint sounds of clothes rustling. “So good for me. How bad do you want it, love?” 

She feels herself _throb._ “So bad,” she pants, “I want you inside me—your fingers, your cock—want your mouth on my neck—” 

The moan he lets out makes her toes curl. “Yes,” he says, “I’d finger you open first. Slow, so slow. You’d cry and you’d beg but I’d still go so slow, sweetheart.” 

There’s a faint sound in the background, barely audible over his voice. Slick and wet. She pictures him, lying down, one hand stroking his cock slowly. Thinking of her. “Raha—” 

“Is that what you want? Do you want me to finger you until you’re begging?” 

“I want you to _fuck_ me.” 

“Ah, of course,” he breathes. “How should I take you, I wonder? From behind, pinning your wrists down so you can’t move away, only lie there and take what I give you?” 

Oh _gods._

“Or maybe on your back, so I can see your pretty tits bounce as I fuck you so hard the bed shakes. Your face when I come inside you, when you feel it spilling out of you.” 

“Raha—” 

“But maybe,” he cuts her off, breath heavy, “maybe I should make you work for it, this time. Maybe I’d lie there and let you _gallop_ , enjoy the view of you bouncing on my cock—” 

“Raha, I _can’t,_ ” she whimpers. “Please, please let me—” 

“You’ve been so good, sweetheart,” he whispers. “Go ahead.” 

Shiori’s toes curl against the bedspread as she finally, _finally_ shoves her hand down her smallclothes and slides two fingers inside herself, grinds desperately against her palm. She closes her eyes and tries to pretend it’s G’raha’s fingers inside her, but it doesn’t quite work. His fingers are long, so much longer than hers, so much _thicker_ — 

“‘S not enough,” she whines. “‘S not enough, Raha, I need—I need you.” 

“Gods,” he grits. “I wish I could—want to touch you, want to see you. Make you feel so good—” 

“You do,” she gasps. “You always do.” 

“Spread your legs for me, love. Moan for me. I want to hear you.” 

Shiori does. She’s sure she must look debauched, sweater hiked up, hand shoved down her smalls and legs spread out, but there’s not an onze of shame in her as she gets off on looking like this, on looking like this _for him—_

“I’m close,” she whimpers. “I’m already—I can’t—” 

“Don’t,” he commands. Her whole body shudders. “Say my name.” 

“Raha.” 

“Again.” 

“Raha, Raha, _Raha,_ ” she mumbles, dazed, “I want you here, Raha. Want you inside me, want you to make me come—” 

“Gods, Shiori,” he pants. “ _Wicked white_. Come for me.” 

Shiori obeys. Her climax hits her so hard she’s certain she _screams_ , but she can’t hear it, mind going blissfully blank, back arching off the bed and vision flashing white. She lies frozen as the aftershocks ripple through her, faintly hears a rush of static on her ear—G’raha panting, groaning softly. 

It’s quiet for a few long moments after that, their ragged breaths the only sounds between the two of them. 

“Gods,” she pants when she finds her voice again, “that was—” 

“Incredible,” G’raha says, voice croaky. “You’ll be the death of me, someday.” 

She giggles. “So you’ve said so many times.” 

“How do you feel?” 

“Great,” she answers, pulls her sweater back down and the covers over her body. “Tired.” 

“You really should get some rest.” 

She hums, eyelids feeling heavy in the afterglow, G’raha’s voice a soothing melody in her ear. “Will you stay with me? Until I fall asleep.” 

“Of course,” he answers. She hears the smile in his voice, heart swelling, and lets the sweet nothings he whispers lull her to sleep. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this became way longer than i expected (': thank you for reading my horny crimes
> 
> you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	29. day #28 — irenic. wolgraha, 713 words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #28 — irenic.** /īˈrēnik, ī-ˈre-nik/: _adjective,_ aiming or aimed at peace.
>
>> She’s fourteen when grandmother teaches her the cards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a brief part of this references [shuffle.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243509/chapters/64941661)
> 
> or: when you have no ideas for a prompt, just do some tarot again

There aren’t many things that help Shiori feel at peace, which is why when she finds something that does work, she tends to cling to it with singular desperation. 

She’s fourteen when grandmother teaches her the cards. 

There’s something irenic about being able to peer into your own future, even should it be in the form of vague predictions and cryptic imagery. She keeps the cards close, learns to speak to them like they’re comrades and to take their advice to heart. She gets better, more accurate, as time passes. Grandmother ruffles her hair and tells her she’s proud. 

When she and her brother find themselves on a ship to a foreign land, she shuffles the run-down deck in her hand like one would speak to an old friend. There’s no particular question in her mind, her hands simply following the practiced movement. One small familiar thing amidst a sea of unfamiliarity. 

Then a card slips from the stack, falling to the floor like the petals would fall from the trees in spring, back home. She picks it up, and almost wants to laugh. _Death_ , reads the text beneath a bird’s skeleton, scattered feathers clinging to its bones. 

She stares at it for a long moment, then sweeps it back with the others. She closes her eyes and lets herself think of home. 

  


*

  


Shiori draws the Knight of Wands the morning of the day she meets G’raha Tia, and somehow it doesn’t feel surprising. _Enthusiastic_ is definitely the word to describe him, if she had to pick one other than _pest_. 

But he grows on her against all odds, across quiet evenings and idle banter and whispered confessions of things she’d never told anyone but found herself at so much ease telling _him_ of all people. 

It scares her, feeling this vulnerable. 

So she goes to her deck like a schoolgirl would go to her friends for advice about a crush, shuffles it thoroughly and thinks of him as she pulls three cards out of the stack. 

There’s only a sinking feeling low in her stomach as she stares at the Hanged Man, the Five of Cups, and the Three of Swords. She picks up the cards and gathers them back into a pile, the little velvet bag she carries her deck in sitting undisturbed on a corner of her tent for weeks after. 

Her friends tell her of sacrifice, heartbreak and grief. For the first time in her life, she finds herself wishing they’re wrong. 

  


*

  


Giving a reading to the Exarch is definitely on top of Shiori’s list of most entertaining things she does while on the First, if only for the way the man gets so _flustered_ , something she hadn’t seen before slipping through the cracks of his carefully crafted mask. 

And, well. If she takes some pleasure in essentially telling him _the cards say you’re a liar, my lord_ , that’s only for her to know. 

But things stop being quite so amusing when he draws the Two of Cups and her chest tightens as she thinks of this person who must be so special to him. It could be Lyna, maybe, she tells herself—the Two of Cups doesn’t _always_ mean romance—and then immediately feels like a fool for even caring. She doesn’t even know who he is. 

_Yet you still feel the way you feel,_ comes Ardbert’s voice in her mind, making her grimace. _Shut up_ , she thinks to nobody, and moves on to the next card. 

  


*

  


“This fell out of your bag.” 

She puts the medicine she’d been preparing back down with a low thud. “How many times do I have to tell you to _rest_ , G’raha Tia.” 

“Oh, not calling me Raha,” he says with mock hurt, cheeky little brat, reaching from behind to wrap her into a loose one armed hug. “I’ve really done it this time, then.” 

He places something down on the table. A cup in black and white against a colourful background, a pattern remindful of stained glass. A friend. 

“Ace of Cups,” G’raha reads, intrigued. “And what might this one mean?” 

Her hands come over his, lips splitting into a smile as she picks the card up. 

“Good things,” she answers simply. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "love's beginnings", if you were curious
> 
> sorry this was a short one, but thank you for reading <3 you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	30. day #29 — paternal. lyna&exarch, wolexarch, 1.6k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #29 — paternal.** /pəˈtərnl, pə-ˈtər-nᵊl/: _adjective,_ of or appropriate to a father.
>
>> Lyna does not remember her parents.

Lyna does not remember her parents. 

The fact pains her less than she would like to admit. 

  


*

  


She is far too young when she loses them. 

She doesn’t remember it, nor does she know the details, only bits and pieces she has heard from others in the Crystarium across the years. All she knows is that it happens because of the Sin Eaters, and that she’s far from the first. What she _does_ remember is clinging to the Exarch’s robes as he talked to someone and they told him things about _no one else is able to_ and _far too many orphans_ and being young and small and terrified. 

She remembers him tucking her into bed that night and she remembers asking him, tears in her eyes and a knot on her throat, if she would have to leave, if he was going to come back tomorrow. 

He had smiled and told her she had nothing to worry about, then sang to her until she fell asleep. 

  


*

  


She’s eleven the first time she says it. 

The Exarch stops mid-sentence, mouth agape in a way that would be comical were she not so nervous. There’s a long moment of silence after, and she’s a second away from apologizing and playing it as a joke when he kneels in front of her. 

“I’m glad you see me as such, Lyna,” he says, the gentle smile she’s so used to back in his face. “But perhaps ‘grandfather’ would be more appropriate, considering my years.” 

She fidgets. “You don’t mind?” 

“No,” he says, reaching to brush a lock of hair away from her face, “I don’t mind at all.” 

  


*

  


Being a teenager was not easy for her and, in hindsight, it probably was even less so for him. 

“I’m sorry, Lyna,” he says. She doesn’t look at him. 

She hadn’t meant for him to find her. 

It’s the second time a girl breaks up with her because she finds her grandfather too _intimidating_ , and while the first time has been easy enough to brush off, this one hurt more than she could bear. _I’m sorry, Lyna,_ this one, the one she had actually liked, had said. _It’s just too much, being with someone like you. I’m sorry._

She had stayed silent and nodded and watched her walk away, then found a quiet corner where she could hide and let herself cry. But he found her, he always finds her, and though she had always been thankful for that, right now he’s the last person she wants to speak to. 

He speaks again when he gets no answer from her. “I understand how you feel, and if there was anything I could—” 

“You understand how I feel?” she spits, and already a part of her regrets doing so when she sees how he’s taken aback, lips parting in surprise, but she can’t stop. “How could _you_ understand how I feel? You—you never—” 

She stops, uncertain. _Has_ he ever loved anyone? She certainly hasn’t seen him show that sort of affection towards anyone, but she knows he’s lived many times her years. Had there been someone, before she was born? 

The fact that she doesn’t know brings another sort of pain to her heart. She calls him her grandfather, yet she knows close to nothing about him. Not even his face. 

“Lyna—” 

“You don’t tell me anything,” she says, quiet and shaky and hurt. His hand stops in the air where it was halfway to reaching for hers, and he’s silent for an unbearably long moment. 

“I do know, Lyna,” he says at last, uncharacteristically quiet. “I had someone too. A very long time ago.” 

Her ears perk up, the pain she feels almost buried under the shock. It’s almost laughable, how much this single, vague admission astounds her, but it _is_ the most personal thing he’s ever told her. 

She knows he won’t answer if she asks _who_ or _when_ , and she’s too afraid to ask _does it ever stop hurting,_ so she asks the next thing that comes to mind. “Do you still love them?” 

He goes so still she fears she’s given offense. 

“I do,” he says, after many beats of silence. The smile on his face pains her to look at. 

  


*

  


Something clicks the moment she lays her eyes on Shiori Minami. 

She wants to ask almost immediately, but there’s no room for her selfish pursuit of tiny smidgens of information about her grandfather when their whole world is changing and her men die at the hands of Sin Eaters and the Eulmoran army at every turn. But the night returns, and so does the Exarch, face finally uncovered for all to see, and Lyna finds herself approaching the Warrior of Darkness when the first opportunity presents itself. 

She finds her in the Mean, alone for once, looking down at the city below. 

“Warrior of Darkness.” 

Shiori jumps ever so slightly. It feels a bit comical that the warrior who laid low five Lightwardens is so easily startled. 

“Lyna,” she smiles, turning around to face her. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” 

She’s been wanting this for so long, yet now that she must _ask_ she feels terribly nervous. What will she do if the answers she finds make him even more of a stranger to her? 

“I have noticed you and the Exarch seem acquainted,” she confesses before she can convince herself to back down. “I had hoped you could—” she feels like a child all over again, “you could… tell me about him.” 

“Oh,” Shiori blinks, seeming equal parts surprised and confused. “He hasn’t—?” 

The question fills her with an odd sort of shame. “No.” 

“I see,” she says quietly, eyes falling somewhere on the floor. “What would you like to know?” 

_Anything_. She joins her in leaning against the railings, looking down at the bustling city her grandfather built. “What was he like? When you two first met.” 

Shiori’s smile returns at that, though her eyes seem to look towards something far beyond the sight in front of them. “Young. Brash. So cheeky it often irritated me beyond measure,” she answers, but there’s only fondness in her voice. “Bright. Knowledgeable beyond his years. Braver than I could have ever been.” 

She pauses, an emotion Lyna can’t quite describe flashing through her eyes for the briefest of moments. 

“He was a historian, I’m sure you’re aware.” _I’m not,_ Lyna thinks, stomach twisting unpleasantly. “It was his work that led us to meet, when I found myself tasked with ridding that very tower of certain hostile forces. He introduced himself by making a show out of jumping down from this stupidly high place, had a fondness for mimicking the deeds of the heroes in the epics he liked to read.” 

Lyna blinks. The thought of the Exarch doing something of the sort almost makes her want to laugh, were her shock not bigger than her amusement. She stands there and listens as Shiori tells her this tale of a boy and a tower, of secrets uncovered and sacrifices made, and her chest tightens with every word. 

“You seem fond of him,” she says for lack of better words, when Shiori finishes. 

The look in her eyes grows painfully wistful. Once again she fears she’s somehow given offense. 

“I suppose I am,” she answers at last, and Lyna dares not decipher the emotion in her voice. 

  


*

  


She is patrolling the Crystarium grounds when she sees the two of them, many weeks later. 

The fact they are in a very public space does little to assuage the feeling that she’s somehow intruding, but she finds herself too curious to avert her eyes. They’re sitting on the grass on the Quadrivium, barely any space between them. She can only see their backs from where she stands, but it’s enough to see there’s a book open across both their laps, Shiori seeming to be the one reading it aloud, her fingers skimming over the pages. 

The Exarch listens, or she assumes he does, in spite of the fact he looks at the woman’s face more often than at the pages, expression bearing an unspeakable fondness. He reaches to place his hand overs hers, and she stops mid-sentence. Lyna watches as he holds the Warrior’s hand and brings it up to his lips, then presses a kiss to her palm, eyes boring into hers with impossible gentleness. 

Lyna looks away, and keeps walking. 

  


*

  


She knows before Shiori says it. 

Her eyes are vacant, and she clutches the vessel close to her chest like she would sooner die than let go of it. 

“You were family to him,” Shiori tells her. “I hope you know that—” 

“Please take care of him,” Lyna says before she can continue. She can’t bear it, not now. Shiori nods silently. 

Neither of them cry. Neither remembers how. 

  


*

  


Lyna does not remember her parents, but she does remember the Exarch. 

She remembers being young, scared and alone; remembers clinging to his robes and his hand on her head, warm and gentle. She remembers him reading to her at night, the lullabies he used to sing. She remembers his clumsy attempts at styling her hair that he would apologize for even though she loved them desperately, and she remembers the terrible lump of a cake that he baked for her tenth nameday and how it was the best she’d ever had. 

She remembers the last time they spoke, under a starshower that felt apocalyptic in its beauty. She remembers how holding her tears until he was out of her sight was the hardest thing she’s done her whole life. 

She remembers seeing her grandfather, gleaming in azure, the gentle smile he’d shown her so many times now frozen in his features for eternity. 

It pains her more than she can bear. 

She wouldn’t have had it any other way. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i had so many ideas for this prompt and ended going with the one that was hardest to write. sorry this is kind of rough (': i've been wanting to write something with lyna's pov on graha/wolexarch the whole month, but it ended up being harder than i expected.
> 
> as always, thank you for reading! you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/).


	31. day #30 — splinter. wolexarch, 1.3k words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **day #30 — splinter.** /splɪn.tər, splɪn.tɚ/: _verb,_ to split into fragments, parts, or factions; break or cause to break into small sharp fragments.
>
>> She’s a star, he has always known, wearing the night sky over her shoulders and hiding constellations in her eyes—and only the star knows her secrets and her fears, what lies in the splintered shards of her heart. He may never fully piece them back together, but for as long as she allows him, he will continue to try.

His first encounter with her night terrors happens without him being aware of it. 

The cowl still hides his face when he finds Shiori in the stairs to the Dossal Gate. It’s also three in the morning and unbearably chilly, yet she sits on the steps in nothing but a long nightgown. The garment combined with her white hair and pale skin makes her appear ghastly; it reminds him of the way she looked in the dreams he had back when he first woke in a world where she no longer existed. 

This one is no specter, however. This one does not scream at him, does not cry, does not curse him for failing her like the one that comes to him at night does. This one, however, does nearly jump when he approaches her and says her name, quiet and hesitant. 

“Exarch,” she breathes, looking back at him with wide, tired eyes. “You startled me.” 

“Apologies,” he says, moving to sit beside her. “Is sleep eluding you?” 

“You could say that,” she chuckles, self flagellating. “Do you have nightmares, my lord?” 

_Every night._ “Sometimes.” 

She hums in understanding. A cold breeze blows past them, and he sees gooseflesh erupt on her skin. Silently, he unwraps his crimson toga and drapes it over her shoulders. She freezes. 

“W—Are you—” 

“You shouldn’t be out in the cold at this hour, my friend.” 

She looks bewildered, as if unsure of why he would ever do something like this. A part of him wonders, pained, if she’s not used to being cared for; another swells with something warm and possessive as he watches her clutch his robes around herself. She looks small and frail and nothing like the Shiori he sees in daytime, with her easy smiles and resolute bravery. Every ilm of him aches with the urge to hold her. 

“Did you really not find him?” 

He blinks. “Pardon me?” 

“My friend,” she explains, not looking at him. “G’raha Tia. Did you really not find him?” 

His turn to freeze. 

“I’ve had a lot of people die on me, Exarch,” she says. “Don’t try to spare me pain. It’s not a kindness.” 

She thinks him dead. Was this—were her nightmares—? 

“I found no person within the tower when it was passed into my care, dead or otherwise,” he says. It’s dreadfully comical how it pains him more to tell the truth than all of the lies he spins for her every day. “That, I swear to you, is the truth.” 

Shiori sighs deeply, the way he knows only a person who’s exhausted to their very core can. 

“I see,” she says, and they leave it at that. 

  


*

  


The second time, he witnesses it as it happens. 

G’raha had ever been a light sleeper. Since he was a babe, even, as his mother often told him, awakening in the night at the slightest of sounds. Shiori was much the same, he’d come to learn—slept lightly and quietly and awakened at the lightest nudge, usually already so alert one could barely tell she had been asleep. 

Which is why he’s terrified when, for the first time, he can’t seem to wake her. 

He wakes with a startle himself, a whimper so _pained_ coming from the woman beside him it chills him down to the bone. She sleeps coiled, tightly wound; her hands are fisted into his shirt like she can’t bear to let go, tears rolling down her cheeks. 

“Shiori,” he tries, quietly, “Shiori, wake up.” 

She whimpers again, mumbles something he can’t decipher and her fists on his clothes tighten until her knuckles. She squirms for a moment, then lets out a _wail_ that hits him like a hailstorm. 

“Shiori”, he tries again, “Shiori, please, wake up. I’m here.” 

He holds her wrists where they rest against his chest, tries to pull them away but she doesn’t relent. The tears keep coming, then another wail, and he realizes with a painful twist in his stomach that she’s not the only one who’s crying now. 

“Wake up, love,” he pleads, desperate, “I’m here, I can help, but please, you need to _wake up._ ” 

He grabs her shoulders, _shakes_ her, and finally, finally, her eyes shoot open, wide and full of fear. She gasps, as if she had been underwater and finally broke through the surface, breathes heavily and clings to him like a scared child. 

“I’m sorry,” she mutters, shaky and teary, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry—” 

“It’s okay,” he says hurriedly, tucks her head beneath his chin and holds her close. “You don’t need to apologize, it’s okay. You’re okay.” 

He holds her until the tears stop, until the sobs racking her body come to an end. She doesn’t speak and neither does he. Eventually, her breathing slows back to normal, and she falls back asleep. He doesn’t. 

  


*

  


“Ah,” says Thancred after G’raha approaches him. “So it still happens then?” 

_Still._ His stomach twists unpleasantly. “This is a common occurrence?” 

Thancred sighs. “I’m not sure if _common_ is the word for it. The fact is I don’t know much more than you do, as she and I have never actually shared a room through the night. All I know I have heard from Alphinaud, who has spent many a night in the wake of her nightmares himself.” 

G’raha remains silent. _How much do you yet not know about her?_

“What I do know is that they had already started by the time the two of them found themselves in Ishgard, and that their frequency decreased significantly after the liberation of Doma.” 

“I don’t know what to do to help her,” he confesses miserably. “I don’t know if I can.” 

Thancred offers him a sympathetic smile, one hand coming upon his shoulder. “The lass has a heart as brittle as glass, Exarch, but glass is only brittle until it shatters—then it’s sharp. It’s how she’s managed to survive.” 

He speaks of her with a fondness he has only heard in his voice in the way he talks to his young charge. The part of him that used to be so desperately jealous of him shrivels in shame. 

“You needn’t help her, really. Just be there to pick up the splinters. It’s about time she’s had someone who’s not afraid to bleed.” 

  


*

  


The third time, he asks. 

“What do you see in them?” 

She blinks, bloodshot eyes drifting away from his, hesitant. Her mouth opens as if to speak, but she closes it again. 

“You needn’t say it, if you’re not comfortable,” he says gently, giving her hand a reassuring squeeze. “I merely thought it might help ease your mind.” 

“It’s not that I’m uncomfortable,” she sighs. “It’s just that I don’t often remember, myself. There are some which are… recurring. Then there are others who seem to come and go as they please, leaving the feelings behind but taking the memories with them.” 

She pauses, seems to mull over something in her mind, then continues. “The recurring ones are usually… memories. My childhood. The day I lost my parents. All the other people I’ve lost, through the years. They come and… say things. Do things, sometimes. To me, or themselves. And I can’t—I can’t stop them.” 

Her voice cracks. He brings her closer, squeezes her tight against himself, and lets her hide her tears in his chest. 

“You needn’t suffer them alone,” he says. “It pains me to not be able to offer anything more than my company, but—” 

“It’s plenty, Raha,” she says, quiet, softly. “It’s enough.” 

She’s a star, he has always known, wearing the night sky over her shoulders and hiding constellations in her eyes—and only the star knows her secrets and her fears, what lies in the splintered shards of her heart. He may never fully piece them back together, but for as long as she allows him, he will continue to try. 

She smiles at him with weary eyes and tear stained cheeks, arms wrapping around his waist like she’s afraid he might let go. He kisses the silvery crown of her head, and holds her until she falls back asleep. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 35k words across thirty days and thirty prompts, all posted within the twenty-four hour window. it honestly feels surreal to have been able to done this, but i mean it when i say i couldn't have done it without you guys' support. publishing fic again after several years of not writing anything has been challenging, but the overwhelming support i've received and the amazing people i've befriended through this challenge have done much to soothe my anxiety and rekindle my love for writing. thank you all so much, from the bottom of my heart. <3
> 
> i believe what you're likely to see from me next is The Longfic™, a sort of 5.0 retelling in which i plan to portray the development of graha and shiori's relationship through shadowbringers, and of which some pieces i've written here will likely be part of. we'll see!
> 
> you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/deathflares) and [tumblr](https://verthunder.tumblr.com/). read more about ffxivwrite [here](https://ffxiv-write.carrd.co/). as always, thank you for reading!


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